Pinball Wizard
Ball 2
Who wants to be a wizard?
If you're not jumping up and waving your...
Ball 2
Who wants to be a wizard?
If you're not jumping up and waving your...
Pinball Wizard [SI, Keychain of Creation]
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Ball 2
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Pinball Wizard
Ball 2
Who wants to be a wizard?
If you're not jumping up and waving your hand going 'I do! I do!' at least a little on the inside then you have no sense of fun. And or are probably lying through your teeth.
I picked up the cup of tea from the tray with a little smile, blowing on it softly as I cradled it in my hands, "Thanks."
"You're welcome." The young man bowed slightly and moved to offer our shared boss the jug of sake, which she took daintily.
Everyone, at some point in their lives, wants that bit of wonder, that hint of amazement and beauty, that impossible thing called magic in their lives. We want it. We crave it. We almost breathe it. Maybe not for our entire lives, maybe not forever, hell, maybe even not for long. But everyone, at some point or another, wants to speak those silly faux latin words and wiggle their fingers and tell the universe to sit down and shut up, and for the universe to go 'Yes mass'ah'.
I took a careful sip of the scalding hot tea-!
"Gack-!"
My boss tittered at that, the damn witch, "The hell'd you do? Enchant the cup so that it didn't transfer the heat? Guh…"
Vainly, I blew out through my mouth to try and cool my scalded tongue as the woman proceeded to guffaw quite inelegantly for someone as beautiful as her. But then again, that was her prerogative.
If you put your mind to it, you could probably put any number of logical reasons behind people wanting to have magic, or be wizards, or however you wanna say it. There were probably plenty. But generally, we grow up to accept that no, we can't be true wizards. Myself included.
And, no, this is not the point where I say something like 'But now I'm an exception' or such as that. I still accept that I'm not going to be a true wizard, because there's a difference between doing magic and being a wizard. That and I accepted this under duress and I don't think that counted.
"So how'd things go?" she drawled, idly swirling the blatant jug of sake about, still giggling slightly as she reclined on the cushion across from me.
But I was a magic user. Which was nearly as cool.
"Oh come on boss, you know exactly how well." I rolled my eyes at that before muttering, scowling down at my too hot tea, "Not at all. I'm lucky to still have all my limbs and most of my brain cells."
A soft clunk drew my attention back up to my boss, she'd set the jug of sake down a bit harder on the matts of the floor. But what made me pause was that instead of a teasing or mocking smile on her pale face, there was a serious and concerned look, "Boss?"
So my master decided that was a great time to throw me for a loop, "I can't see you in the realms I send you."
I very nearly fumbled my tea straight into my lap, but Kimihiro beat me to the question I'd wanted to ask, "What?!" The serving tray he'd been using was pointed angrily at our boss as he shouted, "You're sending him into dangerous places without even a way to check up on him?! What kind of crazy boss are you?!"
She beamed serenely at the tall young man, waving off his concerns, "Oh Watanuki, don't be silly, of course I have a way to check up on him." The dark haired Asian teen started to relax before Yuko tilted her head to the side and continued blithely, "We're doing it right now~"
"That's not any better!" Kimihiro shrieked, making Yuko giggle and myself chuckle in spite of myself. He was way too easy to rile up.
"Don't worry Watanuki, Jacob was perfectly safe," I snorted even as the younger man started to relax, "He's so much more reliable than you that there's nothing to worry about."
"Grk," the words hit Kimihiro like an arrow to the heart, making him flinch, "I'm not-!"
"He immediately got along with Mokona. Handles the spiritual realm just fine. And even handled pipe fox quite handidly."
Further metaphorical arrows struck Kimihiro even as I rolled my eyes. Our boss was exaggerating by a mile to mess with Kimihiro, but the kid made it way too easy. A happy little trill came from the fuzzy length of spirit wrapped around my neck was mentioned. Obligingly, I reached up to scratch the top of pipe-fox's head, getting a little kiss on my cheek in return.
Yuko's shop was a nice place honestly. It seemed like a classic Japanese mansion of sorts, somewhere between mansion and shop. The girls were out and about in the shop for some reason or another, as was Mokona. I didn't want to think too hard about what the Black Mokona was getting up to.
The story of how I got roped into this is actually surprisingly boring.
I walked into a shop for some strange reason, and was made an offer I couldn't refuse.
Yuko and Kimihiro bickered back and forth some… better described as Yuko trolling the ever loving fuck out of the teen as he sputtered and ranted and raved. And these were my boss and co-worker respectively.
… eh, I've had worse.
And weren't we a hoity toity trio? I was in a full, black three-piece business suit, infuriatingly pale with my brown hair cut short. Kimihiro Watanuki was in his usual japanese school clothes, he was distinctly Asian, and a surprisingly experienced eye told me he was somewhere between Chinese and Japanese, which was unusual. It was also a bit unusual that he was taller than me. I mean, I'm far from tall at five and a half feet, but it was still rare to see an Asian definitively taller than me. Yuko on the other hand didn't count, pale as the grave and yet still beautiful, with black hair long enough to touch the floor when she stood and with more layers to it than an ogre, she had on an expensive as hell Chinese dress that was more expensive than even my own suit.
Yuko and I were sitting on a pair of cushions on the mats, my shoes were off in the corner somewhere, as was my overcoat, and Kimihiro was up and about, doing his 'job' of serving Yuko as an assistant and getting us drinks. Tea in my case, and alcohol for our boss.
"I am too reliable!"
Speaking of which, "If I may, Kimihiro-kun?" I interjected before Yuko could continue messing with him.
Immediately, the Japanese polite upbringing kicked in and he straightened out, bowing just a bit, "Ah, yes?"
"The tea is wonderful, though I'm still pretty hungry after getting back." I bowed slightly, "I'd really appreciate it if you could make a little something."
"Oh sure, what would you like?"
I smiled a bit, "Whatever you're comfortable making really. I'm not a huge fan of sushi though."
"Sure. I'm happy to make something for someone that asks nicely!"
The last bit was shouted at Yuko, but rolled off of her like water off a duck's back as she beamed at him, "It'd be great if you got some treats for me too Watanuki~"
"Get some yourself you old hag!"
Despite the interplay, the teen still turned around and half stomped half walked towards the shop's kitchen, muttering under his breath like good ole' Yosemite Sam.
Moments after Kimihiro had left the room, Yuko turned back to me with a contemplative look in her eyes. She knew I'd gotten Kimihiro out of here for a reason, but I didn't do her the satisfaction of jumping straight into it. Instead, I sipped my tea with a smile, I might suck at the whole 'subtle' thing that wizards are supposed to do, but I could at least try for mysterious.
"What happened there, Jacob?"
"Well, first day went pretty well. Arrived in a totally new world with minimal fuss and terror, only panicked for a little while. Went out to get some stuff going, try out that little bit of magic you bestowed on me…" I trailed off for a moment before waggled my fingers at my temple, "And got discovered and mind whammied by a vampiress."
Yuko, attentive up till that point, went nearly deathly still, and I had a feeling that if she were any less refined her jaw would have dropped slightly with the way her eyebrows shot up and eyes widened. Then a bit of sorrow, subdued and small, crossed her face, before finally something thoughtful entered her eyes. "That would certainly explain why you didn't react well on seeing me again."
"You totally look the part," I admitted freely with a shrug, "You don't have the right predatory aura though thankfully, that's never pleasant to experience."
Her red eyes stayed locked on mine, searching, and probably seeing more than I'd be comfortable with if I knew. But eh. Not a big deal- "I'm sorry."
I blinked.
Okay, now that brought me up short. I hadn't gotten used to sorries, not like that. Not that it was bad or that I didn't believe she wasn't, just that I hadn't expected it. "For what? I knew what I was getting into when I made the deal."
Yuko, the beautiful dimensional witch, gave me a sad smile, "But it wasn't truly a choice, not for you."
"No, not really." I agreed easily, "But you offered, and I accepted knowingly."
I'd walked into Yuko's store without realizing it, I hadn't even meant to… but when I had, the beautiful witch had asked me a question, 'What do you wish?'
It'd caught me off guard, and I wasn't really sure. What did I wish for that I could pay the price to get? I'd jokingly asked… and she had supplied a possible wish.
Unfathomable cosmic power… itty bitty responsibility.
But really… I guess it was the other way around for me. It was a duty in return for the ability to fulfill it.
Yuko quietly packed something into the end of her long and ornate pipe, looking up at me, "I'm guessing you escaped, otherwise we wouldn't be talking."
Shifting my cup of tea to my left hand, I pulled Prometheus from my pocket and flipped the fancy lighter open, "More like I was broken free than anything else." The image formed in my mind, the desire, the working, the Imago–
Transmutation = 1 7 (9 1) (9 8 7) 6 5 (8 4) 1 2 = 4 Successes
–and a flick of my thumb lit Prometheus, an arc of orange connecting the lighter with Yuko's pipe for a brief instant before it faded into wisps of nothing, leaving a lit pipe in its wake.
Red eyes looked up at me even as she raised the pipe, "I was passed around in the vampire community for a while, got real good at giving them the illusion of life."
I actually hadn't minded that too much, sometimes it was horrible. I was giving monsters in the shape of men a glimpse of humanity as they reveled in their horrifying nature. But other times, I felt… happy. Past the whammies on my mind, past the blood addiction, past the servile nature they'd forced onto me… most were afraid, desperate, just wanting to feel alive again, to not feel like they were a monster. And the hope I could inspire in the eyes of something that had moments before been just… inhuman… to see that… it'd been more than worth it sometimes.
Still focusing on the end of her pipe, I waited until I was sure that the filling had caught before I snapped Prometheus closed and slipped the overly ornate lighter-multitool cross back into my pocket, "Eventually some other mages cottoned on to my predicament and that I wasn't exactly a willing subject and busted me out."
"That must have been quite exciting." The tone of her voice might have been teasing, as was the upturn of her lips, but it didn't reach her eyes. Those spoke of an understanding.
Given that I'd been rather thoroughly mentally fubar at the time, I had been rather unhappy at my 'rescue'. Thankfully, the vampires had gone out of their way to not let me learn how to fight.
"Indubitably. Going cold turkey off of vampire blood after that sucked though." I smiled a bit, though it was honestly somewhat strained. I was understating things, "And the mages that swept me up weren't exactly nice either. At very least they weren't really my style."
My eyes fell to the floor as I remembered the Seers of the Throne, Susan, Asmodeus, Set, Imotep, names of people I called friends for a time… but… just because they were friendly didn't make them good people, or people that I could work with.
I hissed in pain at a sudden flare of heat on my fingers, looking down to find that a splash of the hot tea had hit my hand due to the shaking of my hands. Lips pressing into a thin line, I tightened my grip until the shaking stopped.
The warm golden bit of Yuko's smoking pipe bumped into the back of one of my hands. I glanced up with a pout before pushing it away, "Hey, get your drugs away from my drug."
Her concerned look melted into an amused smile at my tone, and I grinned back at her in return. "I'm alright," I assured my boss quietly, "It sucked at the time, but I've gotten over it."
Leaning back against the wall, Yuko watched me carefully, "How did you find it?"
Over it or not, I definitely appreciated that she didn't linger on the mess. "Luck at first. I literally stumbled across the Infrastructure in searching for Mysteries to improve my magic." I gave her a sly look, "Considering you didn't really describe anything about my magic, I had to figure it out on my own."
Yuko waved it off dismissively, "I had faith that you'd figure it out."
I rolled my eyes, "I'm not sure if I should be happy or sad that I'm not getting Kimihiro's sort of magical education." With exaggerated drama, I pressed the back of my hand to my forehead and looked to the ceiling, "What a horrible master I have, throwing her apprentice out into the wilds to learn magic without any education."
A small sniffle brought my gaze back down to find my boss even more dramatically fallen over, "How horrible… to be cursed with an ungrateful apprentice that doesn't appreciate the secrets of the universe being bestowed upon him." Another exaggerated sniffle before she drank deep of the jug of sake she had beside her, "Oh woe is me!"
Snorting, I couldn't help but grin, "No fair, you have boobs so you're automatically better at this than me. And you were doing so great until the 'oh woe is me' bit, come on, it's too cliché."
Another sniffle was my only response.
Rolling my eyes, I instead sipped my still quite hot tea.
Having had her fun, Yuko harrumphed and settled down into a reclined position, bringing her long pipe to her mouth to puff on it quietly as she swirled her drink about slowly. "Jacob…" her eyes met mine and I had to resist the urge to shiver at the weight of years hidden in her pattern, "You succeeded."
I looked away from her gaze, staring down at my cup as I sat there all crisscross applesauce, "… I got lucky. I barely was able to get into the final event, where it'd left itself vulnerable in an all or nothing gambit… and that's only because of the connections I'd made with other factions like the vampires."
Prince Fredrick had pulled my poor little ass out of the fire multiple times there towards the end…
"How did it happen?" the taller woman prompted quietly as she reclined, smoking her pipe.
"I kept thwartin' its plans. It was bad. So bad it tried to kill me." I glanced away in mock thought, "Repeatedly." The exaggerated 'ahhhh' look Yuko gave me made me smile, but I continued, "It was little stuff at first, but as I gathered allies and power I was able to be a monkey wrench in even its bigger plans… so the thing went all or nothing, a final gambit, it either win, or it lost. And it needed a human to give it access…"
The dimensional witch considered that for a moment before her eyes widened marginally in realization, "It needed Free Will to give itself up… they had to choose to give up choice."
I wasn't surprised that she'd picked up on it that quickly, she was the single most powerful spellcaster I've met so far. And considering that some of the mages I'd dealt with in the last world were able to Unmake entire cities, retroactively alter the course of time, and predict things literal centuries in the future to a measure of accuracy that they could have a phonograph replying to me in real time… let's just go with 'My boss is terrifyingly powerful' and leave it at that.
"Yeah, that was my best guess as well. It used a key. A literal key by the way, if one made of horrifying Supernal Truths…" my hand came up to touch the lock around my neck… a literal if very ornate padlock of interlocking gears and mechanisms… it'd been dangling from my neck for the entirety of my stay. It and the mythril chain it'd dangled from being the closest thing to indestructible I'd ever encountered, and refusing to be removed…
While the silver chain still looped through the lock's hoop, the padlock was opened.
"I'm gathering that it didn't succeed."
"I got lucky." I reminded her softly, toying with the lock that had almost been a part of me without looking at it… "The person who actually got the key very nearly unlocked the doors, and there wasn't anything I could do at the time. But they decided not to in the end… and gave the key to me to be destroyed."
Yuko straightened, halfway sitting up, "The lock worked?"
"Yeah." I paused before giving her a decidedly unhappy look at that, "You seriously didn't know if it'd work?" Master or not, that was harsh.
She didn't even have the dignity to look sheepish about that, "No. I knew it'd bind you to the reality and lead you to the true lynchpin of its plans, but I wasn't sure if it'd be able to destroy it on its own or if you would have to get… creative."
"Creative she says," I muttered, deliberately looking away and talking like she wasn't there, "Like that's gonna help when destroying the central lynchpin of the workings of a god that bind it and its plans to a reality…"
"For you, it would."
The surety in her tone was outright unsettling. I shivered and looked away.
"Jacob."
"If you're going to give me a speech about how I'm the one who can do it the easiest, please don't." I shifted into a somewhat more comfortable position on the cushion I was sitting on, "I already know."
A small smile graced her lips, she'd sat up fully when I wasn't paying attention, "No, you were just convenient." I rolled my eyes at that, smiling in spite of myself. I knew better, and I was a lot harder to rile up than Kimihiro. But then a delicate and inordinately pale hand extended towards me, palm upwards, "Regardless, the lock?"
I blinked, looking at her in confusion; and it took an inordinately long time for it to click, "Oh, right."
Sheepishly, I took the opened padlock off of the silver loop dangling from my neck and leaned forward to place it into Yuko's hand. She smiled just a bit at that as she brought the padlock over, setting her jug of sake on the floor and leaving her long pipe to dangle from her mouth as she turned the padlock over in examination.
While she did that, I took the opportunity to sip my tea and softly scratch pipe-fox's head behind the little nubs of her ears. I rather enjoyed the happy little trill she let out as she snuggled into place, tightening around my neck, the tip of her tail flicking back and forth against my back as she rested her little head atop my ear. It was honestly weird to be missing my… the padlock. I'd literally worn the thing constantly for years in the World of Darkness. It was a 'Key Item' (Hah!) and was as close to indestructible as mattered, at absolute minimum anything capable of damaging it would have vaporized me just by sheer proximity. It'd been as constant as my hand or leg, so I felt… not naked, but very exposed without it. Heh.
It'd actually taken me a while to get used to it and to figure out how to comfortably wear a tie while keeping the necklace tucked away, but I'd managed. Didn't care for ties, but you had to make a good impression on the big wigs and a suit was the bare minimum required in most cases.
"Jacob."
My name broke me out of my pleased reverie, "Boss?" I looked back at her, finding a neutral expression on her face and the lock long gone.
"You need to go," her voice was soft, but insistent.
"… to the bathroom?" I snarked in spite of myself. But I knew what she meant. Respite wasn't part of the deal.
There was a flash of amusement across her face before it faded, "You can't stay here long."
I took a deep breath, ready to argue, to ask to stay and relax and so many more things but… I let it out with a sight, looking down at the cup in my hands, "Rules?"
She nodded, "Rules."
A small groan escaped me, "How long do I have?"
"A day," Yuko said simply, taking a puff of her pipe.
"Which kind?" I asked, "Sunrise to sunset? Or sunrise to sunrise?" Either one was mystically meaningful, but it wasn't always clear which from saying 'a day'.
"Sunset to sunset," she supplied before blowing out a smoke ring.
"At least I get to get to try Kimihiro's cooking this time." I twisted my teacup around in my hands a few times before glancing up at my boss, an amused smile dancing across my face, "Are we even in my home reality right now?"
"No."
"Tch, figures." I rolled my eyes before shaking my head, "No real point staying then…" My eyes flicked up to her face, "Unless you're able to spend time teaching me…?"
Technically she was my master and I was the apprentice, even if the extent of her teaching had basically been "SECRETS OF THE UNIVERSE, BE HERE!" in a sort of weird reverse of the classic 'demons begone' sort of thing. But Yuko shook her head, "I'm sorry. I can't."
"Eh, no point in dawdling then if you're not gonna teach me anything." I smiled warmly at her. There honestly wasn't, this wasn't home any more than the alley I'd first appeared in before was, any more than Her haven had been. The closest thing I'd had to a home was destroyed so… here's to hoping to find a new home wherever I end up?
My lips twitched into a shit-eating grin before I dramatically leaned back, "What a terrible master, not even willing to teach her apprentice anything before sending him out again! Oh woe is me!"
"Hypocrite." She countered easily, a demure smile on her lips.
"Eh," I shrugged freely, "Only sometimes."
Another little smile from her as she took a puff from her pipe. A comfortable silence settled over the two of us as I straightened back out on the cushion. I took the opportunity to finish downing my tea with a little sigh. It was… actually really comforting to be here. More so than I expected. Maybe that was because I didn't have to worry about any backstabbing here, maybe because Yuko, for all her deviousness, was a good person… or maybe because she'd been the one to Awaken me… I didn't know why, but I was comfortable here.
Something niggled though, "So where am I going this time?"
Downing a swig of her sake, Yuko just smiled, "No clue~"
"… you are way too cheerful about that." I muttered, setting my cup down beside me, "No idea at all?"
"No idea at all!" a cheerful girls voice cried from behind me.
"None at all!"
I did not jump.
I did whip out Prometheus and scream a bit.
"You two are way too quiet!" I half shrieked at Maru and Moro, having nearly rose to a crouch with Prometheus open and in hand. After a second, I got my voice back under control, "Also, hi Mokona."
"Wa'sup?" the little black… thing… raised a limb in greeting with a smile.
"Awww…" The two gray skinned girls that had basically appeared right behind me, looked at me sadly, "Are you–"
"–mad at us?"
I rolled my eyes, forcing myself to settle back down and close Prometheus, "No, I'm not mad. But please don't scare me like that?" My heart was thudding in my chest at that, almost did something stupid there. Got way used to paranoia honestly. "I don't want to hurt you two."
"Oh."
"Okay!"
Still disconcerting how easily they finished each other's sentences.
"Girls," Yuko interrupted with a small smile, "Did you bring it?"
"We brought it! We brought it!" they chorused cheerfully before bounding around on either side of me towards Yuko.
It was only now that I realized they'd each been carrying a jewelry box, both of which were held out towards the Dimensional Witch.
Stuffing Prometheus back into my pocket, I watched as Yuko placed the padlock into one of the boxes, "I don't know where you're going any more than you do. I merely pull on the threads, the trinkets I give you are your anchors to that reality, anchored into the lynchpin of its design."
From the other, she pulled out a disk on a long chain and continued to explain, "It's like pouring wax into the keyhole of a locked door to mimic the key. It allows you to enter the locked reality and gives you an impression of the lock it was used on, but the only way out is to find its key, for the wax key breaks upon use."
I scowled slightly as she passed the disk over to me, a silver chain dangling from it as well. It had four engraved runes on one side, arranged around a central divot that seemed to be made for a gemstone… the runes looked familiar but without actively engaging my Mage Sight I wasn't sure… "But if you're putting it to the door, how do you not know where it goes?"
Yuko smiled just a bit at that, "The metaphor isn't perfect. I'm searching for the doors that the Occult Mechanism has locked, but that doesn't mean that I know where those doors are relative to everything else."
"And people wondered why I wasn't a huge fan of sympathetic magic," I muttered, running my fingers over the disk, earning a small giggle from Yuko.
The disk was made of… something? Bleh. My talents were extremely ill suited for this. I focused on Mind and Matter and had a measure of power in the likes of Life and Death, but this item was a thing of Fate and Space, two of my weaker Arcanum. And if Yuko couldn't divine this thing, then I sure as hell I couldn't.
Didn't mean I wasn't going to try at some point and time, but fuck, I didn't expect a miracle.
"Same rules as before?" I asked, examining the disk. One of the runes seemed like a stylized sun, another like a stylized moon, another was just some strange runic combination that I didn't recognize, and something that looked like… a planet? Not sure.
"You put that on and you will appear in another universe," she confirmed, "If you die there, you die in truth. You will be stuck there until you find the key."
"And in order to get the key," I finished, staring at the disk, trying to figure out why the runes seemed familiar, "I need to destroy the God-Machine."
"Yes."
I sighed, letting my hands fall back to my lap, a small smile on my face, "Well… at least I get to try Kimihiro's cooking this time?"
I gave the chain around my neck a few tugs, The familiar thin silver chain didn't budge, stubbornly refusing being removed as it always had since I'd put it on…
"It won't come off."
Glancing up at my boss I raised an eyebrow at her as I grinned, "I kinda gathered that. But I thought it was just the link?"
We were standing in the nice little Japanese style garden that was a part of the shop, waiting for Kimihiro and the others to return with my washed overcoat Yuko was watching me in amusement as I let the fine silver chain drop back atop my button up shirt, "It is. But it's the manifestation of the link between your existence and that world now, rather than your soul and the lock."
I glanced down reflexively, even if I couldn't really see the chain from this angle, "That's… surprising. I thought the connection would unravel when I opened the lock…"
She beamed at me, "Nope~ You're stuck with it."
"Glorious," I drawled, putting every bit of sarcasm I could into the word. Not that it kept me from smiling at her.
The taller witch reached over and ruffled my short hair, "You'll be fine."
I playfully batted her hand away, "With any luck."
"Here we go! Here we go!"
"Hey! Stop! You'll trip me!"
Kimihiro walked out, dodging the two artificial beings who were dancing around him as he brought my overcoat, Mokona resting atop his head.
"Be careful."
The words, softly spoken as they were, had be glancing over at my boss, finding the taller woman watching Kimihiro dodge the girls. Warmth bled into my bones as I turned to watch the comedy routine of the four, "You expect otherwise?" Without either of us looking at each other, Yuko's hand brushed against my shoulder briefly and meaningfully. The action made me cringe as I picked up on the insinuation. "Well, outside of extenuating circumstances."
She just smiled, "I do expect to see you again, Jacob."
"I plan to be seen again." I countered with a grin as Kimihiro came to a stop. He held the overcoat out and I accepted it with a smile, "Thanks."
With a practiced motion, I threw my overcoat on. I'd deliberately taken a page from Dresden's book and gone with what amounts to a duster, the long coattails protected my legs, and it was roomy enough to shield someone else in an emergency. And then I'd enchanted the ever loving fuck out of the damn thing. I'd added a hood to the thing to provide some additional head protection and because c'mon, hoods were cool. The overcoat was so dark of a green to nearly be black, matching the vest part of my three-piece suit, but the rest of my suit was jet black. All of the buttons and cuff links were a glorious golden color with a different rune engraved on each.
I had my tie tucked into one of the pockets of my vest, hanging out partially at the moment, and my rich purple button up shirt opened up slightly so I could slip the chain within after I'd traveled.
The only thing I'd deviated from my fancy, business-style clothing was a pair of heavy, if very nice, black boots. Because running was a very good skill to have and dress shoes were shitty for that.
And here I was teleporting off to a wholey new world and reality… to face off against an eldritch and cosmic machine.
At least I'd look good while doing it?
I pulled the pendant from my pocket–
Kimihiro scurried back several feet, hiding behind one of the pillars holding up the awning of the shop facing the garden.
I rolled my eyes at the extreme reaction, "Big baby."
"I am not a baby! Last time you did this you disappeared in a flash and a bang and it was really loud!"
Blinking, I glanced over at Yuko for confirmation, and found that she'd eased back a good distance as well when I wasn't looking, the two girls flanking her on either side as the Dimensional Witch held Mokona.
"… oh…" my face flushed slightly in honestly misplaced embarrassment, "Sorry then. I retract my previous statement."
"Thank you for visiting, we hope you have a safe journey." My master said formally, bowing slightly, the girls doing so in synch with her.
"Ah!" Kimihiro halfway jumped out from behind the support beam and bowed quickly, "Yes! Thank you!"
With an affectionate smile, I shook my head at them, "Thank you for having me."
Taking the pendant in both hands, I looked down at the thing, hesitating. I was… afraid. I was worried and concerned and nearly trembling.
Last time I'd put one of these on, I'd spent years in a fugue state, manipulated by a Vampire into doing horrible things, dominated and controlled… even if, intellectually, I knew I had to put this on and that it was unlikely for that to happen again… it was hard.
Resolve + Conviction = 2, 7, 1, 6, 8, 9, 9, 5, 1 = 3 Successes
But I had to do it.
With a sigh, I smiled at my boss, "Alright then! Adios! I'll see y'all later~!"
The cold metal settled against my neck, the disk hitting just beneath my collarbones with a soft thump, and this time I felt it… it was like an anchor around my neck, a spiritual weight dragging me in a specific direction, the world disappearing around me in a flash of colors and butterflies–
I was falling– falling through [████████] and there were things of a thousand, thousand colors. Sensations without words surged around me in striking colors and searing nonlight in an eternity that lasted but an instant before coalescing around me in a flash, taking on solidity and form and distinction once more–
And everything resolved into two hemispheres of blue, one with some streaks of white as I continued to fall–
Random Arrival Roll: 1d6 (Air, Earth, Fire, Water, Wood, Wyld) = 4
*SPLASH*
–straight into water–?!
Burbling in a moment of panic, I thrashed around before forcing myself to a stop.
My lungs burned, I'd swallowed some water in my panic, but panic was the mind killer. Where the fuck was I? In a pool? A lake? … the ocean? Ugh. That was terrifying. But first, I fell into water, where's the surface?
Turning about, I found the light coming from the surface and, with some effort, swam upwards despite the stinging in my eyes from… salt water? Or chlorine? I couldn't tell for sure right now, but it didn't look like there was a bottom…
That… that was very, very scary.
I broke the surface of the water gasping for air, very, very thankful that it was breathable. My head darted around as I treaded water, looking for land or any landmarks.
A cold pit of dread began to settle in my stomach despite the warmth of the waters around me.
Nothing.
No matter how many times I turned around, I saw nothing… no land on the horizon, no discolorations in the water due to reefs or sand banks… just pure, unadulterated ocean… beautiful ocean… but just ocean…
Everywhere. And nothing below me either…
"Water water everywhere and not a drop to drink…" I murmured, tasting the salt on my lips. A small quiver went through my chest cavity despite the lukewarm ocean water, it felt like someone was taking an ice cream scoop to gut me, leaving me feeling small and weak… was… was there anything at all…?
Resolve + Composure = 4, 1, 8, 8, (10, 6), 5, 4 = 3 Successes
Panic threatened to rise in my chest again, but I forced it down. No. Panicking would just mean I'd drown. Stop and think.
Okay… okay. So… what's my first course of action? Something to keep me from having to tread water. What can I do for that?
First thought is to freeze a platform for myself… far from a long term solution but it'd get me out of the water long enough to think about things further.
Legs still kicking in rhythmic motions, I focused, imagining what would need to happen and constructing the magic in my head, the imago starting to take form. Change state of a good bit of water, a platform… make it last for an hour or so… fumbling slightly, I pulled Prometheus out of my pocket and held it tight as I treaded water. It wasn't magic I'd woven into Prometheus because who the fuck expects to be dropped into the middle of the ocean without any equipment?!
… I should apparently.
Right, anyways. Focus.
Taking a deep breath, I let the world fall away, describing the imago in the High Speech under my breath as it started to take form. I'd have to strain myself a bit to make it last long enough to be useful… My will and my power were focused through Prometheus, the lighter might not have been the best tool for this, but its links to the Divine Fire that represented man's will being used through a tool to shape the world around them.
With words and tools I made it happen.
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum <Matter> ; Practice(Weaving) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: State Change."
10 Dice = 2 6 7 3 8 4 2 (10 10 6) 7 6 = 3 Successes ; Wisdom (6 Successes) vs Paradox (1 Success)
It happened all at once, or close enough to it that it didn't matter. A mass of water about fifty feet across suddenly turned into ice and I quite suddenly found myself thrown several feet into the air as it popped up like a cork.
"Wagh?!"
I'd love to say that I landed with grace and beauty, but that'd be a bold faced lie. I fucking belly flopped right back onto the disk of ice I'd created.
"Uggghhhh…" I spent just a few moments laying there, lamenting my decision as I did, sprawled out on the ice, aching slightly from the landing and the paradox backlash of the rushed spell, "This day is starting off greeeaaaaat…"
With a grunt, I pushed myself up and was immediately grateful that I didn't really get seasick because despite having made the disk a pretty solid size, it was still barely stable, bobbing around and shifting on the still ocean.
Shifting about, I flopped into a seated position, giving myself a good little shake as I tried to get into a stable spot on the ice.
Grimacing, I tugged at my suit, thoroughly soaked. With a sigh, I focused slightly, opening a channel to my Path.
Shaping (7 Dice) = 8 2 2 (10 1) 5 3 2 = 2 Successes
The water weighing me down left my clothes with a little snap, a quick rush of liquid raining down onto the ice beneath me.
Grumbling under my breath, I threw my hood up to shield my face from the sunlight. It was… harsher than I remembered, but paler...?
"Okay, what's the plan…"
Nothing but ocean anywhere I looked… no fish I'd seen yet. And the… the mana was heavy around me. And not in a pleasant way either, it was like… like the den of a vampire… or a graveyard… where the Twilight was I? Ugh, question for later.
So, what did I need? I needed water, food… shelter? Not really. My suit and coat were enchanted as all fuck, I'd be comfortable even in a hurricane so long as my 'boat' held out. But food and water were a problem.
I could do some magic for the water bit, food could be harder but still doable… but both of those could be solved if I knew where the fuck I was.
In the immediate, in relation to land sense, not 'place in the universe' sense.
Mentally, I set out the tools I had available even as I set Prometheus in my lap. None of my actual physical equipment was helpful here. Smart phone, smart watch, pocket watch, pocket square / handkerchief, bandages, some basic medicines, my wrench multitool, and Prometheus itself. My dedicated Magus tool was a terrifyingly complicated lighter-multitool, having a good LED light, combination electric / fuel based lighter, tape measure, level, fold-out soldering iron, and a little fold-out screwdriver, with a couple different bit heads slotted into her... all of my equipment enchanted to the limits of my skill with the Matter Arcanum... and not a one of them was useful here.
No paddles, and I didn't have a map so my compass was worth fuck all. I wasn't a master of any of the ten Arcanum. I was a Fourth Degree Adept, but three of those four were the Arcana of Life, Death, and the Mind. Which was about as useful as… well… nothing here. Matter was already proving useful. I was a Disciple of Forces, and an Apprentice of Fate, Prime, and Time. But when it came to Space and Spirit I didn't have a damn inkling, wasn't even an initiate.
"Ugh…" I flopped back onto the ice, scowling up at the blue sky, "The power to rewrite local reality and I still don't have a simple solution…"
"Don't have the raw power to brute force things…" I grumbled to myself. So things were SNAFU, Situation Normal, All Fucked Up. A small smirk danced across my lips, "So that means I'm gonna have to magic the shit out of this."
So, finding stuff was normally the job of Fate or Space… neither of which I was could do worth a damn… depending on how far out I was, I might need to seriously stretch my power… so I'd want to use my better Arcana to search for civilization? Or is civilization as important as just finding a place where I could survive long enough to do more impressive workings?
Pressing my hand to my chest, I'd gauge that I had about 10 units of mana right now... between my spells working properly and Ruling Arcanum spells not drawing on my reserves... I could do my propulsion with Matter rather than Forces to conserve mana... try to do a finding spell with Mind rather than Fate or Life... Mind for translation... but I'd need to use Life to prevent myself from starving or getting too thirsty if things took too long... hrm...
With a little sound, I pushed myself up to my feet. First, reinforce this disk… and reshape it… into a proper, long lasting boat for me to use. Then searching spell, and… I'll figure it out from there.
-oOo-
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum <Matter>, #Practice(Ruling), #Practice(Weaving) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Prometheus) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Alchemical Shaping."
Alchemical Shaping = 6 Dice = 7 1 3 1 (10 10 3) 4 = 2 Successes. Wits + Craft = 2 8 8 9 7 9 3 = 4 Successes.
The boat I'd made from ice was crude as all fuck, good size at about forty feet long, but my knowledge of boat building was marginal at best. It was basically just a sailboat without the sails, having a deck and a 'below deck' and a set of stairs between them… and that was about it. But it'd do for my purposes, function over form and all that. It sat high in the water and wouldn't' be fun if a storm hit, but it'd survive and the ice would last for a month or so. I'd focused too much on the volume of stuff I could control and shape rather than the finesse which I could do so, it'd been like trying to mold playdoh with oven mitts on. Doable, but hard.
I'd fix it later with spot-checks of higher power but smaller spells if I needed to, but it was functional for now.
Scowling slightly, I double checked my runes I'd painted onto the outside of my watch. The digital thing had a stylized compass on its face at the moment, which would act as the focus for the spell. Tiny little funny scribbles all around the thing should channel the power I'd be pouring through it to focus it on the nearest minds, anything else the spell could pick up would be displayed in the margins as numbers, like number of minds and their distance from me.
My stomach growled at me unhappily, but I ignored it. Fucking fast metabolism. If this spell didn't find anyone I'd do something about that, but for now I just ignored it.
Placing a hand over the face of the watch, I closed my eyes and formed the imago in my mind. The mental circuitry my brain interpreted the Mind Arcanum as took shape as I began to speak, using the High Speech to help form the imago and magic, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum <Mind>, #Practice<Knowing>; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Tool) ; Variables(Set) ;" It took some time to build the variables of the spell, probably hours honestly, though I didn't really notice the passage of time outside of the increased gnawing at my stomach, but this was worth the ache to get it exactly right. "Enact:: Find Thoughts."
Find Thoughts 14 Dice (10 8) 1 4 1 1 1 3 3 2 4 8 8 3 (10 4) = 5 Successes
I felt the magic settle into place within the watch… about what I expected, not great but at least I didn't flub the casting.
Opening my eyes I lifted my hand from the watch to look at the face of the watch… wait, what? One mind?
I know the spell probably had a radius of only a dozen miles or so, but I'd expected to find either a cluster of people to represent a boat, a big cluster to represent land, or nothing, not… one. The fuck?
My stomach growled at me unhappily even as I scowled at the face of my watch.
"Oooookayyyyy…"
I ran through the possibilities.
It wasn't a human mind I was looking at, just a sapient and sentient one, so it could be a monster. Bad. Probably at least. It could be someone away from the coast far enough that the spell didn't focus on another group, like clam diving or fishing or such, unusual but far from impossible. Good, and hopefully more likely. A lone survivor on the ocean… bad, but I'd feel like ass if I didn't help them.
Ugh, odds were it wasn't going to be good no matter what, but I had to check it out. I didn't have much of a choice.
"Right, here's hoping for sexy nature spirit or something…" I muttered to myself as I pulled my multitool from my pocket, gripping the wrench and starting to form an imago I'd prepared when I'd shaped the boat.
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Matter>, #Practice(Ruling) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Tool) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Bending."
11 Dice = 3 4 7 1 (9 5) 5 5 4 7 2 7= 1 Success
The spell very nearly didn't work, and my breathing hitched as the gears my mind visualized the Matter Arcanum as skipped and tried to slip. They caught, but just barely.
I cringed slightly at that even as I lifted my arms, my right hand with the watch held out before me palm downwards, and my left held out behind me palm up.
The water behind the ship rose up even as the water in front lowered and I created a gloriously watery version of an Alcubierre drive, pushing the ship forward.
Keeping an eye on the compass and adjusting my manipulation of the water accordingly, I sailed my ship of ice that I'd formed from the ocean by willing a wave into existence behind it towards the unknown mind I'd found by saying funny words over a watch.
Fuck I loved magic.
…
"… wish I knew some sea shanties…" I muttered as my ship moved forward at an easy pace, "It'd make this go faster…"
The other ship was a little sailboat, like, teensy, with only a single occupant. One that even from here felt like a powerful Cainite…
That was… worrisome. At least it was a person?
"Ahoy!" I shouted as I eased my ship up nearby… no motor… simple construction… I eased open my Mage Sig█████–HOLY FUCKING FUCKER FUCK–?!
Willpower = 8 8 9 (10 7) 7 6 1 6 2 = 4 Successes
I actually flinched away from the █████ that just rolled off of the person in the boat. Holy- just… damn. That was like opening your eyes and finding a spotlight turned on your face. Guh, she was like a damn star within the Death Arcanum. Just… fuck.
"A-Ahoy!" Yeah, that flash of █████ definitely gave a feminine impression. She sounded young and kind of scared honestly. Hopefully I could put her at ease and find out what was– "Aharr yarr ho ho yahar?!"
… well there goes any hopes I had of easy communication. Grumbling to myself, I eased up on my propulsion as my ship came to a stop beside hers. Spell time then. A quick, quiet little chant of High Speech and a familiar imago formed as I moved to the railing, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Mind>, #Practice<Weaving>; Yantra(Mantra) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Universal Language."
9 Dice = 4 1 9 2 6 4 7 4 4 = 1 Success
I blinked as I felt the spell settle into place. God damn, what was it with me and fumbling with my magic recently? Ugh, anyways, let's try this again, "Sorry! I didn't catch that! Could you repeat it?!"
Shouting over the rudimentary rail, I watched her carefully, holding Prometheus in my hand just in case.
"Sheesh, really?" She muttered, probably thinking I couldn't hear her over the splashing of the water against the hulls of our ships, "Greetings! What brings you to these waters?!" Definitely nervous. Not that I could blame her given that I'd sailed up to her in a ship made of ice in particularly warm waters, obviously propelled by a persistent wave.
The ship eased to a halt alongside hers and I finally got a good look at her.
Pale, vampire pale at that. That inhuman albino pale, black hair, headband, red eyes… she had a little tattoo at the corner of her left eye, a little downward swirl, a black tube top, black skirt, sandals, and a necklace that was a small silver circle at the end of a chain. She was petite, probably just a bit over five feet tall, but looked to be a young adult more than a teen. Honestly, if it weren't for the sun shining overhead I'd have assumed she was a vampire given the nature of █████ that hung around her like a shroud. But even with as much power as she had, she did not have enough to just no-sell the sun like that. No vampire outside of maybe Caine could have done that, and even then… there were some practices that could've made it plausible... but something was off. She didn't seem like a vampire to me.
Revelation = Chance Die (6) = Failure
But a cursory examination revealed jack diddly. I'd worry about it later, just be wary for now.
"I'm lost!" Wary didn't preclude being cheerful at least. I admitted the fact freely, I'd been considering how to go about this on the way here and a measure of honesty was the best response. Try and figure stuff out without giving things away and all that rot. "Got literally plunked down in the middle of the ocean and had to make do. Yourself?"
She shifted in place as she stood in her small, single person wooden boat with a sail, her arms wrapped loosely around her waist, "I'm… headed towards the North."
… descriptive. Still… "Care for a tag along? I'm not joking about the whole lost bit, and if you have an idea where to sail I'd be more than happy to share the boat with you." This could be a horrible decision, but I didn't have much in the way of options right now… that and she seriously seemed familiar for some reason.
"On that thing…?" her eyes glanced over my ship, which I had mentally dubbed the Ice Ice Baby.
"It's sturdier than it looks," let's ignore the part where it doesn't look sturdy in the first place please, "And I can always just magic up better if it's a problem."
She seemed to think about it for a few moments before glancing up at me, "It… might be dangerous… I'm on the run from the Silver Prince."
Okay, this whole familiarity thing is gonna bug me. I scowled, "Who? The name's familiar but I'm having a brain fart."
Her eyes darted to the side and I very nearly didn't hear her, "The Deathlord."
I blinked.
"Ohhhhh…" That… that explained a lot of things, "You're an Abyssal aren't you?"
"I–!" She stiffened before wrapping her arms around herself, lightly touching the necklace with a hand as she looked away, "… yes…"
Exalted.
I think I had an inkling about who I was talking to now… and even if I was wrong, "How'd you like to come aboard? I might be able to do something about the whole 'being found' bit, not so sure about the 'being a Deathknight' part, but I might surprise us both there."
Her red eyes met my gray-green ones and there was burgeoning hope there, but also an intelligent wariness, "Really…?"
"With any luck. Come on up, just be sure to bring a rope tied to your boat, I should be able to turn that thing into something useful to make sailing easier."
It took her but moments to tie off a rope to the boat and leap up the half dozen feet onto the Ice Ice Baby, still holding the other end as well as the anchor. The motion was so casual as to be somewhat disconcerting.
Landing beside me nervously, she set the anchor down and I turned to face her, smiling as warmly as I could manage. I extended a hand towards her, "It's a pleasure to meet you, please, call me Kenobi. How about you?"
"I- um…" she cringed slightly as she straightened out, "You want my name?"
"It's usually helpful to know what people are called when conversing with them, yes." I snarked with a grin.
"Um, right… well… I'm…" she shuffled in place for a moment before visibly gathering her courage and taking a deep breath, "The Most Secret And Sorrowful Of All The Bearers Of The Endless Destiny Of All Creation Which Wander Admist Forgotten Sights And Fallen Tears Along The Tread Of Ancient Ashen Footsteps Through The Shadow Of That Which Comes And Into That Riotous Cacophony Which Births All Fools And Steals All Beauty," the words were becoming more strained… was she really…? "Who Heralds Through Her Silence The Stillness And Chill Of Those Who Were Not Born And Who… Will Not Fade 'Till All Things Fall And… In That Most Grim Harvest Form The… Final Restful Tomb Of… All Awakened Life And… All The… Sleep… Less… De–"
*whump*
And she hit the deck.
Yes she really.
I snorted, facepalming as I snickered, "Can't believe she didn't think to just pause and take a breath."
Shaking my head, I knelt beside her fainted form, brushing a lock of black hair out of her face, "You're adorable, but very silly… doing something like that and passing out around someone you don't know…"
Tenderly, I eased her into a hopefully more comfortable position laying on the deck. I doubted she'd be out for very long… but…
A small smile worked its way onto my face, "Don't worry, Secret. You're safe with me."
Ball 2
Who wants to be a wizard?
If you're not jumping up and waving your hand going 'I do! I do!' at least a little on the inside then you have no sense of fun. And or are probably lying through your teeth.
I picked up the cup of tea from the tray with a little smile, blowing on it softly as I cradled it in my hands, "Thanks."
"You're welcome." The young man bowed slightly and moved to offer our shared boss the jug of sake, which she took daintily.
Everyone, at some point in their lives, wants that bit of wonder, that hint of amazement and beauty, that impossible thing called magic in their lives. We want it. We crave it. We almost breathe it. Maybe not for our entire lives, maybe not forever, hell, maybe even not for long. But everyone, at some point or another, wants to speak those silly faux latin words and wiggle their fingers and tell the universe to sit down and shut up, and for the universe to go 'Yes mass'ah'.
I took a careful sip of the scalding hot tea-!
"Gack-!"
My boss tittered at that, the damn witch, "The hell'd you do? Enchant the cup so that it didn't transfer the heat? Guh…"
Vainly, I blew out through my mouth to try and cool my scalded tongue as the woman proceeded to guffaw quite inelegantly for someone as beautiful as her. But then again, that was her prerogative.
If you put your mind to it, you could probably put any number of logical reasons behind people wanting to have magic, or be wizards, or however you wanna say it. There were probably plenty. But generally, we grow up to accept that no, we can't be true wizards. Myself included.
And, no, this is not the point where I say something like 'But now I'm an exception' or such as that. I still accept that I'm not going to be a true wizard, because there's a difference between doing magic and being a wizard. That and I accepted this under duress and I don't think that counted.
"So how'd things go?" she drawled, idly swirling the blatant jug of sake about, still giggling slightly as she reclined on the cushion across from me.
But I was a magic user. Which was nearly as cool.
"Oh come on boss, you know exactly how well." I rolled my eyes at that before muttering, scowling down at my too hot tea, "Not at all. I'm lucky to still have all my limbs and most of my brain cells."
A soft clunk drew my attention back up to my boss, she'd set the jug of sake down a bit harder on the matts of the floor. But what made me pause was that instead of a teasing or mocking smile on her pale face, there was a serious and concerned look, "Boss?"
So my master decided that was a great time to throw me for a loop, "I can't see you in the realms I send you."
I very nearly fumbled my tea straight into my lap, but Kimihiro beat me to the question I'd wanted to ask, "What?!" The serving tray he'd been using was pointed angrily at our boss as he shouted, "You're sending him into dangerous places without even a way to check up on him?! What kind of crazy boss are you?!"
She beamed serenely at the tall young man, waving off his concerns, "Oh Watanuki, don't be silly, of course I have a way to check up on him." The dark haired Asian teen started to relax before Yuko tilted her head to the side and continued blithely, "We're doing it right now~"
"That's not any better!" Kimihiro shrieked, making Yuko giggle and myself chuckle in spite of myself. He was way too easy to rile up.
"Don't worry Watanuki, Jacob was perfectly safe," I snorted even as the younger man started to relax, "He's so much more reliable than you that there's nothing to worry about."
"Grk," the words hit Kimihiro like an arrow to the heart, making him flinch, "I'm not-!"
"He immediately got along with Mokona. Handles the spiritual realm just fine. And even handled pipe fox quite handidly."
Further metaphorical arrows struck Kimihiro even as I rolled my eyes. Our boss was exaggerating by a mile to mess with Kimihiro, but the kid made it way too easy. A happy little trill came from the fuzzy length of spirit wrapped around my neck was mentioned. Obligingly, I reached up to scratch the top of pipe-fox's head, getting a little kiss on my cheek in return.
Yuko's shop was a nice place honestly. It seemed like a classic Japanese mansion of sorts, somewhere between mansion and shop. The girls were out and about in the shop for some reason or another, as was Mokona. I didn't want to think too hard about what the Black Mokona was getting up to.
The story of how I got roped into this is actually surprisingly boring.
I walked into a shop for some strange reason, and was made an offer I couldn't refuse.
Yuko and Kimihiro bickered back and forth some… better described as Yuko trolling the ever loving fuck out of the teen as he sputtered and ranted and raved. And these were my boss and co-worker respectively.
… eh, I've had worse.
And weren't we a hoity toity trio? I was in a full, black three-piece business suit, infuriatingly pale with my brown hair cut short. Kimihiro Watanuki was in his usual japanese school clothes, he was distinctly Asian, and a surprisingly experienced eye told me he was somewhere between Chinese and Japanese, which was unusual. It was also a bit unusual that he was taller than me. I mean, I'm far from tall at five and a half feet, but it was still rare to see an Asian definitively taller than me. Yuko on the other hand didn't count, pale as the grave and yet still beautiful, with black hair long enough to touch the floor when she stood and with more layers to it than an ogre, she had on an expensive as hell Chinese dress that was more expensive than even my own suit.
Yuko and I were sitting on a pair of cushions on the mats, my shoes were off in the corner somewhere, as was my overcoat, and Kimihiro was up and about, doing his 'job' of serving Yuko as an assistant and getting us drinks. Tea in my case, and alcohol for our boss.
"I am too reliable!"
Speaking of which, "If I may, Kimihiro-kun?" I interjected before Yuko could continue messing with him.
Immediately, the Japanese polite upbringing kicked in and he straightened out, bowing just a bit, "Ah, yes?"
"The tea is wonderful, though I'm still pretty hungry after getting back." I bowed slightly, "I'd really appreciate it if you could make a little something."
"Oh sure, what would you like?"
I smiled a bit, "Whatever you're comfortable making really. I'm not a huge fan of sushi though."
"Sure. I'm happy to make something for someone that asks nicely!"
The last bit was shouted at Yuko, but rolled off of her like water off a duck's back as she beamed at him, "It'd be great if you got some treats for me too Watanuki~"
"Get some yourself you old hag!"
Despite the interplay, the teen still turned around and half stomped half walked towards the shop's kitchen, muttering under his breath like good ole' Yosemite Sam.
Moments after Kimihiro had left the room, Yuko turned back to me with a contemplative look in her eyes. She knew I'd gotten Kimihiro out of here for a reason, but I didn't do her the satisfaction of jumping straight into it. Instead, I sipped my tea with a smile, I might suck at the whole 'subtle' thing that wizards are supposed to do, but I could at least try for mysterious.
"What happened there, Jacob?"
"Well, first day went pretty well. Arrived in a totally new world with minimal fuss and terror, only panicked for a little while. Went out to get some stuff going, try out that little bit of magic you bestowed on me…" I trailed off for a moment before waggled my fingers at my temple, "And got discovered and mind whammied by a vampiress."
Yuko, attentive up till that point, went nearly deathly still, and I had a feeling that if she were any less refined her jaw would have dropped slightly with the way her eyebrows shot up and eyes widened. Then a bit of sorrow, subdued and small, crossed her face, before finally something thoughtful entered her eyes. "That would certainly explain why you didn't react well on seeing me again."
"You totally look the part," I admitted freely with a shrug, "You don't have the right predatory aura though thankfully, that's never pleasant to experience."
Her red eyes stayed locked on mine, searching, and probably seeing more than I'd be comfortable with if I knew. But eh. Not a big deal- "I'm sorry."
I blinked.
Okay, now that brought me up short. I hadn't gotten used to sorries, not like that. Not that it was bad or that I didn't believe she wasn't, just that I hadn't expected it. "For what? I knew what I was getting into when I made the deal."
Yuko, the beautiful dimensional witch, gave me a sad smile, "But it wasn't truly a choice, not for you."
"No, not really." I agreed easily, "But you offered, and I accepted knowingly."
I'd walked into Yuko's store without realizing it, I hadn't even meant to… but when I had, the beautiful witch had asked me a question, 'What do you wish?'
It'd caught me off guard, and I wasn't really sure. What did I wish for that I could pay the price to get? I'd jokingly asked… and she had supplied a possible wish.
Unfathomable cosmic power… itty bitty responsibility.
But really… I guess it was the other way around for me. It was a duty in return for the ability to fulfill it.
Yuko quietly packed something into the end of her long and ornate pipe, looking up at me, "I'm guessing you escaped, otherwise we wouldn't be talking."
Shifting my cup of tea to my left hand, I pulled Prometheus from my pocket and flipped the fancy lighter open, "More like I was broken free than anything else." The image formed in my mind, the desire, the working, the Imago–
Transmutation = 1 7 (9 1) (9 8 7) 6 5 (8 4) 1 2 = 4 Successes
–and a flick of my thumb lit Prometheus, an arc of orange connecting the lighter with Yuko's pipe for a brief instant before it faded into wisps of nothing, leaving a lit pipe in its wake.
Red eyes looked up at me even as she raised the pipe, "I was passed around in the vampire community for a while, got real good at giving them the illusion of life."
I actually hadn't minded that too much, sometimes it was horrible. I was giving monsters in the shape of men a glimpse of humanity as they reveled in their horrifying nature. But other times, I felt… happy. Past the whammies on my mind, past the blood addiction, past the servile nature they'd forced onto me… most were afraid, desperate, just wanting to feel alive again, to not feel like they were a monster. And the hope I could inspire in the eyes of something that had moments before been just… inhuman… to see that… it'd been more than worth it sometimes.
Still focusing on the end of her pipe, I waited until I was sure that the filling had caught before I snapped Prometheus closed and slipped the overly ornate lighter-multitool cross back into my pocket, "Eventually some other mages cottoned on to my predicament and that I wasn't exactly a willing subject and busted me out."
"That must have been quite exciting." The tone of her voice might have been teasing, as was the upturn of her lips, but it didn't reach her eyes. Those spoke of an understanding.
Given that I'd been rather thoroughly mentally fubar at the time, I had been rather unhappy at my 'rescue'. Thankfully, the vampires had gone out of their way to not let me learn how to fight.
"Indubitably. Going cold turkey off of vampire blood after that sucked though." I smiled a bit, though it was honestly somewhat strained. I was understating things, "And the mages that swept me up weren't exactly nice either. At very least they weren't really my style."
My eyes fell to the floor as I remembered the Seers of the Throne, Susan, Asmodeus, Set, Imotep, names of people I called friends for a time… but… just because they were friendly didn't make them good people, or people that I could work with.
I hissed in pain at a sudden flare of heat on my fingers, looking down to find that a splash of the hot tea had hit my hand due to the shaking of my hands. Lips pressing into a thin line, I tightened my grip until the shaking stopped.
The warm golden bit of Yuko's smoking pipe bumped into the back of one of my hands. I glanced up with a pout before pushing it away, "Hey, get your drugs away from my drug."
Her concerned look melted into an amused smile at my tone, and I grinned back at her in return. "I'm alright," I assured my boss quietly, "It sucked at the time, but I've gotten over it."
Leaning back against the wall, Yuko watched me carefully, "How did you find it?"
Over it or not, I definitely appreciated that she didn't linger on the mess. "Luck at first. I literally stumbled across the Infrastructure in searching for Mysteries to improve my magic." I gave her a sly look, "Considering you didn't really describe anything about my magic, I had to figure it out on my own."
Yuko waved it off dismissively, "I had faith that you'd figure it out."
I rolled my eyes, "I'm not sure if I should be happy or sad that I'm not getting Kimihiro's sort of magical education." With exaggerated drama, I pressed the back of my hand to my forehead and looked to the ceiling, "What a horrible master I have, throwing her apprentice out into the wilds to learn magic without any education."
A small sniffle brought my gaze back down to find my boss even more dramatically fallen over, "How horrible… to be cursed with an ungrateful apprentice that doesn't appreciate the secrets of the universe being bestowed upon him." Another exaggerated sniffle before she drank deep of the jug of sake she had beside her, "Oh woe is me!"
Snorting, I couldn't help but grin, "No fair, you have boobs so you're automatically better at this than me. And you were doing so great until the 'oh woe is me' bit, come on, it's too cliché."
Another sniffle was my only response.
Rolling my eyes, I instead sipped my still quite hot tea.
Having had her fun, Yuko harrumphed and settled down into a reclined position, bringing her long pipe to her mouth to puff on it quietly as she swirled her drink about slowly. "Jacob…" her eyes met mine and I had to resist the urge to shiver at the weight of years hidden in her pattern, "You succeeded."
I looked away from her gaze, staring down at my cup as I sat there all crisscross applesauce, "… I got lucky. I barely was able to get into the final event, where it'd left itself vulnerable in an all or nothing gambit… and that's only because of the connections I'd made with other factions like the vampires."
Prince Fredrick had pulled my poor little ass out of the fire multiple times there towards the end…
"How did it happen?" the taller woman prompted quietly as she reclined, smoking her pipe.
"I kept thwartin' its plans. It was bad. So bad it tried to kill me." I glanced away in mock thought, "Repeatedly." The exaggerated 'ahhhh' look Yuko gave me made me smile, but I continued, "It was little stuff at first, but as I gathered allies and power I was able to be a monkey wrench in even its bigger plans… so the thing went all or nothing, a final gambit, it either win, or it lost. And it needed a human to give it access…"
The dimensional witch considered that for a moment before her eyes widened marginally in realization, "It needed Free Will to give itself up… they had to choose to give up choice."
I wasn't surprised that she'd picked up on it that quickly, she was the single most powerful spellcaster I've met so far. And considering that some of the mages I'd dealt with in the last world were able to Unmake entire cities, retroactively alter the course of time, and predict things literal centuries in the future to a measure of accuracy that they could have a phonograph replying to me in real time… let's just go with 'My boss is terrifyingly powerful' and leave it at that.
"Yeah, that was my best guess as well. It used a key. A literal key by the way, if one made of horrifying Supernal Truths…" my hand came up to touch the lock around my neck… a literal if very ornate padlock of interlocking gears and mechanisms… it'd been dangling from my neck for the entirety of my stay. It and the mythril chain it'd dangled from being the closest thing to indestructible I'd ever encountered, and refusing to be removed…
While the silver chain still looped through the lock's hoop, the padlock was opened.
"I'm gathering that it didn't succeed."
"I got lucky." I reminded her softly, toying with the lock that had almost been a part of me without looking at it… "The person who actually got the key very nearly unlocked the doors, and there wasn't anything I could do at the time. But they decided not to in the end… and gave the key to me to be destroyed."
Yuko straightened, halfway sitting up, "The lock worked?"
"Yeah." I paused before giving her a decidedly unhappy look at that, "You seriously didn't know if it'd work?" Master or not, that was harsh.
She didn't even have the dignity to look sheepish about that, "No. I knew it'd bind you to the reality and lead you to the true lynchpin of its plans, but I wasn't sure if it'd be able to destroy it on its own or if you would have to get… creative."
"Creative she says," I muttered, deliberately looking away and talking like she wasn't there, "Like that's gonna help when destroying the central lynchpin of the workings of a god that bind it and its plans to a reality…"
"For you, it would."
The surety in her tone was outright unsettling. I shivered and looked away.
"Jacob."
"If you're going to give me a speech about how I'm the one who can do it the easiest, please don't." I shifted into a somewhat more comfortable position on the cushion I was sitting on, "I already know."
A small smile graced her lips, she'd sat up fully when I wasn't paying attention, "No, you were just convenient." I rolled my eyes at that, smiling in spite of myself. I knew better, and I was a lot harder to rile up than Kimihiro. But then a delicate and inordinately pale hand extended towards me, palm upwards, "Regardless, the lock?"
I blinked, looking at her in confusion; and it took an inordinately long time for it to click, "Oh, right."
Sheepishly, I took the opened padlock off of the silver loop dangling from my neck and leaned forward to place it into Yuko's hand. She smiled just a bit at that as she brought the padlock over, setting her jug of sake on the floor and leaving her long pipe to dangle from her mouth as she turned the padlock over in examination.
While she did that, I took the opportunity to sip my tea and softly scratch pipe-fox's head behind the little nubs of her ears. I rather enjoyed the happy little trill she let out as she snuggled into place, tightening around my neck, the tip of her tail flicking back and forth against my back as she rested her little head atop my ear. It was honestly weird to be missing my… the padlock. I'd literally worn the thing constantly for years in the World of Darkness. It was a 'Key Item' (Hah!) and was as close to indestructible as mattered, at absolute minimum anything capable of damaging it would have vaporized me just by sheer proximity. It'd been as constant as my hand or leg, so I felt… not naked, but very exposed without it. Heh.
It'd actually taken me a while to get used to it and to figure out how to comfortably wear a tie while keeping the necklace tucked away, but I'd managed. Didn't care for ties, but you had to make a good impression on the big wigs and a suit was the bare minimum required in most cases.
"Jacob."
My name broke me out of my pleased reverie, "Boss?" I looked back at her, finding a neutral expression on her face and the lock long gone.
"You need to go," her voice was soft, but insistent.
"… to the bathroom?" I snarked in spite of myself. But I knew what she meant. Respite wasn't part of the deal.
There was a flash of amusement across her face before it faded, "You can't stay here long."
I took a deep breath, ready to argue, to ask to stay and relax and so many more things but… I let it out with a sight, looking down at the cup in my hands, "Rules?"
She nodded, "Rules."
A small groan escaped me, "How long do I have?"
"A day," Yuko said simply, taking a puff of her pipe.
"Which kind?" I asked, "Sunrise to sunset? Or sunrise to sunrise?" Either one was mystically meaningful, but it wasn't always clear which from saying 'a day'.
"Sunset to sunset," she supplied before blowing out a smoke ring.
"At least I get to get to try Kimihiro's cooking this time." I twisted my teacup around in my hands a few times before glancing up at my boss, an amused smile dancing across my face, "Are we even in my home reality right now?"
"No."
"Tch, figures." I rolled my eyes before shaking my head, "No real point staying then…" My eyes flicked up to her face, "Unless you're able to spend time teaching me…?"
Technically she was my master and I was the apprentice, even if the extent of her teaching had basically been "SECRETS OF THE UNIVERSE, BE HERE!" in a sort of weird reverse of the classic 'demons begone' sort of thing. But Yuko shook her head, "I'm sorry. I can't."
"Eh, no point in dawdling then if you're not gonna teach me anything." I smiled warmly at her. There honestly wasn't, this wasn't home any more than the alley I'd first appeared in before was, any more than Her haven had been. The closest thing I'd had to a home was destroyed so… here's to hoping to find a new home wherever I end up?
My lips twitched into a shit-eating grin before I dramatically leaned back, "What a terrible master, not even willing to teach her apprentice anything before sending him out again! Oh woe is me!"
"Hypocrite." She countered easily, a demure smile on her lips.
"Eh," I shrugged freely, "Only sometimes."
Another little smile from her as she took a puff from her pipe. A comfortable silence settled over the two of us as I straightened back out on the cushion. I took the opportunity to finish downing my tea with a little sigh. It was… actually really comforting to be here. More so than I expected. Maybe that was because I didn't have to worry about any backstabbing here, maybe because Yuko, for all her deviousness, was a good person… or maybe because she'd been the one to Awaken me… I didn't know why, but I was comfortable here.
Something niggled though, "So where am I going this time?"
Downing a swig of her sake, Yuko just smiled, "No clue~"
"… you are way too cheerful about that." I muttered, setting my cup down beside me, "No idea at all?"
"No idea at all!" a cheerful girls voice cried from behind me.
"None at all!"
I did not jump.
I did whip out Prometheus and scream a bit.
"You two are way too quiet!" I half shrieked at Maru and Moro, having nearly rose to a crouch with Prometheus open and in hand. After a second, I got my voice back under control, "Also, hi Mokona."
"Wa'sup?" the little black… thing… raised a limb in greeting with a smile.
"Awww…" The two gray skinned girls that had basically appeared right behind me, looked at me sadly, "Are you–"
"–mad at us?"
I rolled my eyes, forcing myself to settle back down and close Prometheus, "No, I'm not mad. But please don't scare me like that?" My heart was thudding in my chest at that, almost did something stupid there. Got way used to paranoia honestly. "I don't want to hurt you two."
"Oh."
"Okay!"
Still disconcerting how easily they finished each other's sentences.
"Girls," Yuko interrupted with a small smile, "Did you bring it?"
"We brought it! We brought it!" they chorused cheerfully before bounding around on either side of me towards Yuko.
It was only now that I realized they'd each been carrying a jewelry box, both of which were held out towards the Dimensional Witch.
Stuffing Prometheus back into my pocket, I watched as Yuko placed the padlock into one of the boxes, "I don't know where you're going any more than you do. I merely pull on the threads, the trinkets I give you are your anchors to that reality, anchored into the lynchpin of its design."
From the other, she pulled out a disk on a long chain and continued to explain, "It's like pouring wax into the keyhole of a locked door to mimic the key. It allows you to enter the locked reality and gives you an impression of the lock it was used on, but the only way out is to find its key, for the wax key breaks upon use."
I scowled slightly as she passed the disk over to me, a silver chain dangling from it as well. It had four engraved runes on one side, arranged around a central divot that seemed to be made for a gemstone… the runes looked familiar but without actively engaging my Mage Sight I wasn't sure… "But if you're putting it to the door, how do you not know where it goes?"
Yuko smiled just a bit at that, "The metaphor isn't perfect. I'm searching for the doors that the Occult Mechanism has locked, but that doesn't mean that I know where those doors are relative to everything else."
"And people wondered why I wasn't a huge fan of sympathetic magic," I muttered, running my fingers over the disk, earning a small giggle from Yuko.
The disk was made of… something? Bleh. My talents were extremely ill suited for this. I focused on Mind and Matter and had a measure of power in the likes of Life and Death, but this item was a thing of Fate and Space, two of my weaker Arcanum. And if Yuko couldn't divine this thing, then I sure as hell I couldn't.
Didn't mean I wasn't going to try at some point and time, but fuck, I didn't expect a miracle.
"Same rules as before?" I asked, examining the disk. One of the runes seemed like a stylized sun, another like a stylized moon, another was just some strange runic combination that I didn't recognize, and something that looked like… a planet? Not sure.
"You put that on and you will appear in another universe," she confirmed, "If you die there, you die in truth. You will be stuck there until you find the key."
"And in order to get the key," I finished, staring at the disk, trying to figure out why the runes seemed familiar, "I need to destroy the God-Machine."
"Yes."
I sighed, letting my hands fall back to my lap, a small smile on my face, "Well… at least I get to try Kimihiro's cooking this time?"
-oOo-
I gave the chain around my neck a few tugs, The familiar thin silver chain didn't budge, stubbornly refusing being removed as it always had since I'd put it on…
"It won't come off."
Glancing up at my boss I raised an eyebrow at her as I grinned, "I kinda gathered that. But I thought it was just the link?"
We were standing in the nice little Japanese style garden that was a part of the shop, waiting for Kimihiro and the others to return with my washed overcoat Yuko was watching me in amusement as I let the fine silver chain drop back atop my button up shirt, "It is. But it's the manifestation of the link between your existence and that world now, rather than your soul and the lock."
I glanced down reflexively, even if I couldn't really see the chain from this angle, "That's… surprising. I thought the connection would unravel when I opened the lock…"
She beamed at me, "Nope~ You're stuck with it."
"Glorious," I drawled, putting every bit of sarcasm I could into the word. Not that it kept me from smiling at her.
The taller witch reached over and ruffled my short hair, "You'll be fine."
I playfully batted her hand away, "With any luck."
"Here we go! Here we go!"
"Hey! Stop! You'll trip me!"
Kimihiro walked out, dodging the two artificial beings who were dancing around him as he brought my overcoat, Mokona resting atop his head.
"Be careful."
The words, softly spoken as they were, had be glancing over at my boss, finding the taller woman watching Kimihiro dodge the girls. Warmth bled into my bones as I turned to watch the comedy routine of the four, "You expect otherwise?" Without either of us looking at each other, Yuko's hand brushed against my shoulder briefly and meaningfully. The action made me cringe as I picked up on the insinuation. "Well, outside of extenuating circumstances."
She just smiled, "I do expect to see you again, Jacob."
"I plan to be seen again." I countered with a grin as Kimihiro came to a stop. He held the overcoat out and I accepted it with a smile, "Thanks."
With a practiced motion, I threw my overcoat on. I'd deliberately taken a page from Dresden's book and gone with what amounts to a duster, the long coattails protected my legs, and it was roomy enough to shield someone else in an emergency. And then I'd enchanted the ever loving fuck out of the damn thing. I'd added a hood to the thing to provide some additional head protection and because c'mon, hoods were cool. The overcoat was so dark of a green to nearly be black, matching the vest part of my three-piece suit, but the rest of my suit was jet black. All of the buttons and cuff links were a glorious golden color with a different rune engraved on each.
I had my tie tucked into one of the pockets of my vest, hanging out partially at the moment, and my rich purple button up shirt opened up slightly so I could slip the chain within after I'd traveled.
The only thing I'd deviated from my fancy, business-style clothing was a pair of heavy, if very nice, black boots. Because running was a very good skill to have and dress shoes were shitty for that.
And here I was teleporting off to a wholey new world and reality… to face off against an eldritch and cosmic machine.
At least I'd look good while doing it?
I pulled the pendant from my pocket–
Kimihiro scurried back several feet, hiding behind one of the pillars holding up the awning of the shop facing the garden.
I rolled my eyes at the extreme reaction, "Big baby."
"I am not a baby! Last time you did this you disappeared in a flash and a bang and it was really loud!"
Blinking, I glanced over at Yuko for confirmation, and found that she'd eased back a good distance as well when I wasn't looking, the two girls flanking her on either side as the Dimensional Witch held Mokona.
"… oh…" my face flushed slightly in honestly misplaced embarrassment, "Sorry then. I retract my previous statement."
"Thank you for visiting, we hope you have a safe journey." My master said formally, bowing slightly, the girls doing so in synch with her.
"Ah!" Kimihiro halfway jumped out from behind the support beam and bowed quickly, "Yes! Thank you!"
With an affectionate smile, I shook my head at them, "Thank you for having me."
Taking the pendant in both hands, I looked down at the thing, hesitating. I was… afraid. I was worried and concerned and nearly trembling.
Last time I'd put one of these on, I'd spent years in a fugue state, manipulated by a Vampire into doing horrible things, dominated and controlled… even if, intellectually, I knew I had to put this on and that it was unlikely for that to happen again… it was hard.
Resolve + Conviction = 2, 7, 1, 6, 8, 9, 9, 5, 1 = 3 Successes
But I had to do it.
With a sigh, I smiled at my boss, "Alright then! Adios! I'll see y'all later~!"
The cold metal settled against my neck, the disk hitting just beneath my collarbones with a soft thump, and this time I felt it… it was like an anchor around my neck, a spiritual weight dragging me in a specific direction, the world disappearing around me in a flash of colors and butterflies–
I was falling– falling through [████████] and there were things of a thousand, thousand colors. Sensations without words surged around me in striking colors and searing nonlight in an eternity that lasted but an instant before coalescing around me in a flash, taking on solidity and form and distinction once more–
And everything resolved into two hemispheres of blue, one with some streaks of white as I continued to fall–
Random Arrival Roll: 1d6 (Air, Earth, Fire, Water, Wood, Wyld) = 4
*SPLASH*
–straight into water–?!
Burbling in a moment of panic, I thrashed around before forcing myself to a stop.
My lungs burned, I'd swallowed some water in my panic, but panic was the mind killer. Where the fuck was I? In a pool? A lake? … the ocean? Ugh. That was terrifying. But first, I fell into water, where's the surface?
Turning about, I found the light coming from the surface and, with some effort, swam upwards despite the stinging in my eyes from… salt water? Or chlorine? I couldn't tell for sure right now, but it didn't look like there was a bottom…
That… that was very, very scary.
I broke the surface of the water gasping for air, very, very thankful that it was breathable. My head darted around as I treaded water, looking for land or any landmarks.
A cold pit of dread began to settle in my stomach despite the warmth of the waters around me.
Nothing.
No matter how many times I turned around, I saw nothing… no land on the horizon, no discolorations in the water due to reefs or sand banks… just pure, unadulterated ocean… beautiful ocean… but just ocean…
Everywhere. And nothing below me either…
"Water water everywhere and not a drop to drink…" I murmured, tasting the salt on my lips. A small quiver went through my chest cavity despite the lukewarm ocean water, it felt like someone was taking an ice cream scoop to gut me, leaving me feeling small and weak… was… was there anything at all…?
Resolve + Composure = 4, 1, 8, 8, (10, 6), 5, 4 = 3 Successes
Panic threatened to rise in my chest again, but I forced it down. No. Panicking would just mean I'd drown. Stop and think.
Okay… okay. So… what's my first course of action? Something to keep me from having to tread water. What can I do for that?
First thought is to freeze a platform for myself… far from a long term solution but it'd get me out of the water long enough to think about things further.
Legs still kicking in rhythmic motions, I focused, imagining what would need to happen and constructing the magic in my head, the imago starting to take form. Change state of a good bit of water, a platform… make it last for an hour or so… fumbling slightly, I pulled Prometheus out of my pocket and held it tight as I treaded water. It wasn't magic I'd woven into Prometheus because who the fuck expects to be dropped into the middle of the ocean without any equipment?!
… I should apparently.
Right, anyways. Focus.
Taking a deep breath, I let the world fall away, describing the imago in the High Speech under my breath as it started to take form. I'd have to strain myself a bit to make it last long enough to be useful… My will and my power were focused through Prometheus, the lighter might not have been the best tool for this, but its links to the Divine Fire that represented man's will being used through a tool to shape the world around them.
With words and tools I made it happen.
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum <Matter> ; Practice(Weaving) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: State Change."
10 Dice = 2 6 7 3 8 4 2 (10 10 6) 7 6 = 3 Successes ; Wisdom (6 Successes) vs Paradox (1 Success)
It happened all at once, or close enough to it that it didn't matter. A mass of water about fifty feet across suddenly turned into ice and I quite suddenly found myself thrown several feet into the air as it popped up like a cork.
"Wagh?!"
I'd love to say that I landed with grace and beauty, but that'd be a bold faced lie. I fucking belly flopped right back onto the disk of ice I'd created.
"Uggghhhh…" I spent just a few moments laying there, lamenting my decision as I did, sprawled out on the ice, aching slightly from the landing and the paradox backlash of the rushed spell, "This day is starting off greeeaaaaat…"
With a grunt, I pushed myself up and was immediately grateful that I didn't really get seasick because despite having made the disk a pretty solid size, it was still barely stable, bobbing around and shifting on the still ocean.
Shifting about, I flopped into a seated position, giving myself a good little shake as I tried to get into a stable spot on the ice.
Grimacing, I tugged at my suit, thoroughly soaked. With a sigh, I focused slightly, opening a channel to my Path.
Shaping (7 Dice) = 8 2 2 (10 1) 5 3 2 = 2 Successes
The water weighing me down left my clothes with a little snap, a quick rush of liquid raining down onto the ice beneath me.
Grumbling under my breath, I threw my hood up to shield my face from the sunlight. It was… harsher than I remembered, but paler...?
"Okay, what's the plan…"
Nothing but ocean anywhere I looked… no fish I'd seen yet. And the… the mana was heavy around me. And not in a pleasant way either, it was like… like the den of a vampire… or a graveyard… where the Twilight was I? Ugh, question for later.
So, what did I need? I needed water, food… shelter? Not really. My suit and coat were enchanted as all fuck, I'd be comfortable even in a hurricane so long as my 'boat' held out. But food and water were a problem.
I could do some magic for the water bit, food could be harder but still doable… but both of those could be solved if I knew where the fuck I was.
In the immediate, in relation to land sense, not 'place in the universe' sense.
Mentally, I set out the tools I had available even as I set Prometheus in my lap. None of my actual physical equipment was helpful here. Smart phone, smart watch, pocket watch, pocket square / handkerchief, bandages, some basic medicines, my wrench multitool, and Prometheus itself. My dedicated Magus tool was a terrifyingly complicated lighter-multitool, having a good LED light, combination electric / fuel based lighter, tape measure, level, fold-out soldering iron, and a little fold-out screwdriver, with a couple different bit heads slotted into her... all of my equipment enchanted to the limits of my skill with the Matter Arcanum... and not a one of them was useful here.
No paddles, and I didn't have a map so my compass was worth fuck all. I wasn't a master of any of the ten Arcanum. I was a Fourth Degree Adept, but three of those four were the Arcana of Life, Death, and the Mind. Which was about as useful as… well… nothing here. Matter was already proving useful. I was a Disciple of Forces, and an Apprentice of Fate, Prime, and Time. But when it came to Space and Spirit I didn't have a damn inkling, wasn't even an initiate.
"Ugh…" I flopped back onto the ice, scowling up at the blue sky, "The power to rewrite local reality and I still don't have a simple solution…"
"Don't have the raw power to brute force things…" I grumbled to myself. So things were SNAFU, Situation Normal, All Fucked Up. A small smirk danced across my lips, "So that means I'm gonna have to magic the shit out of this."
So, finding stuff was normally the job of Fate or Space… neither of which I was could do worth a damn… depending on how far out I was, I might need to seriously stretch my power… so I'd want to use my better Arcana to search for civilization? Or is civilization as important as just finding a place where I could survive long enough to do more impressive workings?
Pressing my hand to my chest, I'd gauge that I had about 10 units of mana right now... between my spells working properly and Ruling Arcanum spells not drawing on my reserves... I could do my propulsion with Matter rather than Forces to conserve mana... try to do a finding spell with Mind rather than Fate or Life... Mind for translation... but I'd need to use Life to prevent myself from starving or getting too thirsty if things took too long... hrm...
With a little sound, I pushed myself up to my feet. First, reinforce this disk… and reshape it… into a proper, long lasting boat for me to use. Then searching spell, and… I'll figure it out from there.
-oOo-
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum <Matter>, #Practice(Ruling), #Practice(Weaving) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Prometheus) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Alchemical Shaping."
Alchemical Shaping = 6 Dice = 7 1 3 1 (10 10 3) 4 = 2 Successes. Wits + Craft = 2 8 8 9 7 9 3 = 4 Successes.
The boat I'd made from ice was crude as all fuck, good size at about forty feet long, but my knowledge of boat building was marginal at best. It was basically just a sailboat without the sails, having a deck and a 'below deck' and a set of stairs between them… and that was about it. But it'd do for my purposes, function over form and all that. It sat high in the water and wouldn't' be fun if a storm hit, but it'd survive and the ice would last for a month or so. I'd focused too much on the volume of stuff I could control and shape rather than the finesse which I could do so, it'd been like trying to mold playdoh with oven mitts on. Doable, but hard.
I'd fix it later with spot-checks of higher power but smaller spells if I needed to, but it was functional for now.
Scowling slightly, I double checked my runes I'd painted onto the outside of my watch. The digital thing had a stylized compass on its face at the moment, which would act as the focus for the spell. Tiny little funny scribbles all around the thing should channel the power I'd be pouring through it to focus it on the nearest minds, anything else the spell could pick up would be displayed in the margins as numbers, like number of minds and their distance from me.
My stomach growled at me unhappily, but I ignored it. Fucking fast metabolism. If this spell didn't find anyone I'd do something about that, but for now I just ignored it.
Placing a hand over the face of the watch, I closed my eyes and formed the imago in my mind. The mental circuitry my brain interpreted the Mind Arcanum as took shape as I began to speak, using the High Speech to help form the imago and magic, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum <Mind>, #Practice<Knowing>; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Tool) ; Variables(Set) ;" It took some time to build the variables of the spell, probably hours honestly, though I didn't really notice the passage of time outside of the increased gnawing at my stomach, but this was worth the ache to get it exactly right. "Enact:: Find Thoughts."
Find Thoughts 14 Dice (10 8) 1 4 1 1 1 3 3 2 4 8 8 3 (10 4) = 5 Successes
I felt the magic settle into place within the watch… about what I expected, not great but at least I didn't flub the casting.
Opening my eyes I lifted my hand from the watch to look at the face of the watch… wait, what? One mind?
I know the spell probably had a radius of only a dozen miles or so, but I'd expected to find either a cluster of people to represent a boat, a big cluster to represent land, or nothing, not… one. The fuck?
My stomach growled at me unhappily even as I scowled at the face of my watch.
"Oooookayyyyy…"
I ran through the possibilities.
It wasn't a human mind I was looking at, just a sapient and sentient one, so it could be a monster. Bad. Probably at least. It could be someone away from the coast far enough that the spell didn't focus on another group, like clam diving or fishing or such, unusual but far from impossible. Good, and hopefully more likely. A lone survivor on the ocean… bad, but I'd feel like ass if I didn't help them.
Ugh, odds were it wasn't going to be good no matter what, but I had to check it out. I didn't have much of a choice.
"Right, here's hoping for sexy nature spirit or something…" I muttered to myself as I pulled my multitool from my pocket, gripping the wrench and starting to form an imago I'd prepared when I'd shaped the boat.
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Matter>, #Practice(Ruling) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Tool) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Bending."
11 Dice = 3 4 7 1 (9 5) 5 5 4 7 2 7= 1 Success
The spell very nearly didn't work, and my breathing hitched as the gears my mind visualized the Matter Arcanum as skipped and tried to slip. They caught, but just barely.
I cringed slightly at that even as I lifted my arms, my right hand with the watch held out before me palm downwards, and my left held out behind me palm up.
The water behind the ship rose up even as the water in front lowered and I created a gloriously watery version of an Alcubierre drive, pushing the ship forward.
Keeping an eye on the compass and adjusting my manipulation of the water accordingly, I sailed my ship of ice that I'd formed from the ocean by willing a wave into existence behind it towards the unknown mind I'd found by saying funny words over a watch.
Fuck I loved magic.
…
"… wish I knew some sea shanties…" I muttered as my ship moved forward at an easy pace, "It'd make this go faster…"
-oOo-
The other ship was a little sailboat, like, teensy, with only a single occupant. One that even from here felt like a powerful Cainite…
That was… worrisome. At least it was a person?
"Ahoy!" I shouted as I eased my ship up nearby… no motor… simple construction… I eased open my Mage Sig█████–HOLY FUCKING FUCKER FUCK–?!
Willpower = 8 8 9 (10 7) 7 6 1 6 2 = 4 Successes
I actually flinched away from the █████ that just rolled off of the person in the boat. Holy- just… damn. That was like opening your eyes and finding a spotlight turned on your face. Guh, she was like a damn star within the Death Arcanum. Just… fuck.
"A-Ahoy!" Yeah, that flash of █████ definitely gave a feminine impression. She sounded young and kind of scared honestly. Hopefully I could put her at ease and find out what was– "Aharr yarr ho ho yahar?!"
… well there goes any hopes I had of easy communication. Grumbling to myself, I eased up on my propulsion as my ship came to a stop beside hers. Spell time then. A quick, quiet little chant of High Speech and a familiar imago formed as I moved to the railing, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Mind>, #Practice<Weaving>; Yantra(Mantra) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Universal Language."
9 Dice = 4 1 9 2 6 4 7 4 4 = 1 Success
I blinked as I felt the spell settle into place. God damn, what was it with me and fumbling with my magic recently? Ugh, anyways, let's try this again, "Sorry! I didn't catch that! Could you repeat it?!"
Shouting over the rudimentary rail, I watched her carefully, holding Prometheus in my hand just in case.
"Sheesh, really?" She muttered, probably thinking I couldn't hear her over the splashing of the water against the hulls of our ships, "Greetings! What brings you to these waters?!" Definitely nervous. Not that I could blame her given that I'd sailed up to her in a ship made of ice in particularly warm waters, obviously propelled by a persistent wave.
The ship eased to a halt alongside hers and I finally got a good look at her.
Pale, vampire pale at that. That inhuman albino pale, black hair, headband, red eyes… she had a little tattoo at the corner of her left eye, a little downward swirl, a black tube top, black skirt, sandals, and a necklace that was a small silver circle at the end of a chain. She was petite, probably just a bit over five feet tall, but looked to be a young adult more than a teen. Honestly, if it weren't for the sun shining overhead I'd have assumed she was a vampire given the nature of █████ that hung around her like a shroud. But even with as much power as she had, she did not have enough to just no-sell the sun like that. No vampire outside of maybe Caine could have done that, and even then… there were some practices that could've made it plausible... but something was off. She didn't seem like a vampire to me.
Revelation = Chance Die (6) = Failure
But a cursory examination revealed jack diddly. I'd worry about it later, just be wary for now.
"I'm lost!" Wary didn't preclude being cheerful at least. I admitted the fact freely, I'd been considering how to go about this on the way here and a measure of honesty was the best response. Try and figure stuff out without giving things away and all that rot. "Got literally plunked down in the middle of the ocean and had to make do. Yourself?"
She shifted in place as she stood in her small, single person wooden boat with a sail, her arms wrapped loosely around her waist, "I'm… headed towards the North."
… descriptive. Still… "Care for a tag along? I'm not joking about the whole lost bit, and if you have an idea where to sail I'd be more than happy to share the boat with you." This could be a horrible decision, but I didn't have much in the way of options right now… that and she seriously seemed familiar for some reason.
"On that thing…?" her eyes glanced over my ship, which I had mentally dubbed the Ice Ice Baby.
"It's sturdier than it looks," let's ignore the part where it doesn't look sturdy in the first place please, "And I can always just magic up better if it's a problem."
She seemed to think about it for a few moments before glancing up at me, "It… might be dangerous… I'm on the run from the Silver Prince."
Okay, this whole familiarity thing is gonna bug me. I scowled, "Who? The name's familiar but I'm having a brain fart."
Her eyes darted to the side and I very nearly didn't hear her, "The Deathlord."
I blinked.
"Ohhhhh…" That… that explained a lot of things, "You're an Abyssal aren't you?"
"I–!" She stiffened before wrapping her arms around herself, lightly touching the necklace with a hand as she looked away, "… yes…"
Exalted.
I think I had an inkling about who I was talking to now… and even if I was wrong, "How'd you like to come aboard? I might be able to do something about the whole 'being found' bit, not so sure about the 'being a Deathknight' part, but I might surprise us both there."
Her red eyes met my gray-green ones and there was burgeoning hope there, but also an intelligent wariness, "Really…?"
"With any luck. Come on up, just be sure to bring a rope tied to your boat, I should be able to turn that thing into something useful to make sailing easier."
It took her but moments to tie off a rope to the boat and leap up the half dozen feet onto the Ice Ice Baby, still holding the other end as well as the anchor. The motion was so casual as to be somewhat disconcerting.
Landing beside me nervously, she set the anchor down and I turned to face her, smiling as warmly as I could manage. I extended a hand towards her, "It's a pleasure to meet you, please, call me Kenobi. How about you?"
"I- um…" she cringed slightly as she straightened out, "You want my name?"
"It's usually helpful to know what people are called when conversing with them, yes." I snarked with a grin.
"Um, right… well… I'm…" she shuffled in place for a moment before visibly gathering her courage and taking a deep breath, "The Most Secret And Sorrowful Of All The Bearers Of The Endless Destiny Of All Creation Which Wander Admist Forgotten Sights And Fallen Tears Along The Tread Of Ancient Ashen Footsteps Through The Shadow Of That Which Comes And Into That Riotous Cacophony Which Births All Fools And Steals All Beauty," the words were becoming more strained… was she really…? "Who Heralds Through Her Silence The Stillness And Chill Of Those Who Were Not Born And Who… Will Not Fade 'Till All Things Fall And… In That Most Grim Harvest Form The… Final Restful Tomb Of… All Awakened Life And… All The… Sleep… Less… De–"
*whump*
And she hit the deck.
Yes she really.
I snorted, facepalming as I snickered, "Can't believe she didn't think to just pause and take a breath."
Shaking my head, I knelt beside her fainted form, brushing a lock of black hair out of her face, "You're adorable, but very silly… doing something like that and passing out around someone you don't know…"
Tenderly, I eased her into a hopefully more comfortable position laying on the deck. I doubted she'd be out for very long… but…
A small smile worked its way onto my face, "Don't worry, Secret. You're safe with me."
Last edited:
Ball 2 - Travel
- Location
- Florida, United States
Ball 2
Travel
"Mmn…"
I glanced over at Secret briefly, finding her pale face scrunching up as she shifted in place. A small smile crossed my face before I smoothed it away and returned to my task.
"I would say welcome back to the land of the living, but we're in the Underworld so…" I paused in my efforts to shrug. A small groan came from the pale young woman, making me glance at her, "You okay?"
"Yes," she grumbled, red eyes opening to give me a small glare as she pushed her hair out of her face, "That joke was just so bad it hurt."
I chuckled in spite of myself at the snark, grinning as I returned to my work, "Why thank you."
"It wasn't a compliment," Secret muttered, though she looked at me in confusion, "What… are you doing?"
"Magic."
She just raised an eyebrow at me and I smiled, "See, I like magic, so I'm doing magic so I can put magic in my magic so I can magic while I magic."
The look she gave me at that very eloquently conveyed 'What the fuck is this crazy person talking about?' I laughed, so hard.
"Um…"
"I'm joking…" I said through the chuckles before returning to scratching runes onto my skin, "Mostly at least. What I said is technically correct, if totally unhelpful." I paused, adjusting the angle of my watch face and turning my face a few times, checking the rune on my cheek for accuracy. Satisfied, I brought the knife of Prometheus up and carefully began to scratch the lines of the next rune onto my forehead, "See, when the magic brought me here, I didn't know where I was at first, I just knew the… essence around me felt weird." Whoop, almost said mana. Wrong setting. Same basic stuff it seems, but different terminology. "I wasn't able to use it, so I've been trying to be sparing with my magic. But once I realized you were an Abyssal, it clicked. We're in the Underworld, all of the essence is aspected to death and at least partially hostile to living beings like myself."
Secret shifted uncomfortably as she moved to a sitting position on the deck of the Ice Ice Baby. But I continued, "So, since I need motes to actually do anything useful and have any chance of surviving in the Underworld, I need to be able to regain motes… which is what this," I paused to indicate the scratches I was putting into my skin, "Is all about. Allowing me to use all of the power in the air around me, sort of like how you do, just on a massively lesser scale."
While my personal reserves of mana capped out at somewhere right around twelve or so 'units', that felt like it was less than she had in her body. And let's just ignore the fact that she had over twice that in her aura. It wasn't visible to the naked eye right now, but I could just see the power coiling around her like a shadowy flame. And from what I knew, she was comparatively weak. She was still young by a normal person's reckoning, let alone that of an Exalted.
"You can do that?"
"Mhm… well, probably." I admitted with a little shrug, still carefully scratching at my skin with the tip of Prometheus' folding out blade.
"Wait, probably?"
"If I'm wrong and I can't, then I'm going to die of starvation or thirst pretty quickly unless you can help me out there." I glanced at Secret, finding her looking distinctly uncomfortable at that, "But I have a feeling you can't?"
"Not really. There's… not much out here to eat."
"It's okay, I kind of figured. If I get this wrong, I've got enough power to try it a few more times before I have to buckle down and just get us somewhere else."
Pale fingers pressed to equally pale lips as Secret scowled briefly down at the deck of the ship in contemplation. I was able to watch the emotions flit across her face as she did, scratching further runes into my skin while she thought.
Her eyes flicked to the side into nothingness and she briefly chewed on her knuckle before looking back to me, "What all is involved in this?"
"I keep scratching myself up for a bit, then say some funny words that probably mean jack diddly to you…" I paused as a thought occurred to me, "Probably catch on fire for a little bit, and then I can use Death Essence alongside more normal energies for a while."
"Catch fire-?" she squeaked.
A small chuckle escaped me, "Just a little bit. A teensy bit of immolation."
"Oh yes, because that makes it so much better."
I shrugged, "To be honest, I'm not sure it'll happen at all. See, I know what's going to be happening metaphysically, at least I'm pretty sure. But I'm rushing a bit so I'm not completely sure what'll happen physically." Finishing with the runes on my face, I set Prometheus down and began to work my coat and suit jacket off.
"Um… what are you doing?"
"I've got to put some more runes on my chest and stomach," a quick snap of my wrists and I folded the overcoat a few times before setting it on the deck beside me. A smirk found itself on my face, "And magical I may be, but I can't exactly do it through my clothes."
My jacket soon joined the coat, though I took a moment to pull my pocket square out and set it aside for clean up later. Soon though, I was unclasping my dark green vest, the heavily pocketed thing joining my jacket before I began to work on my purple dress shirt. Secret stared for just a moment before looking away in embarrassment, "So-… what am I supposed to do while you get all slicy dicy?"
"If you can manage it, pulling your boat up here or otherwise breaking it down and getting the pieces on this one will save me some time and work."
Secret scowled out over the side of my boat at the top of her smaller ships mast, the only part of it visible over the railing. After a moment, she morosely admitted, "I don't think I can pull that thing out of the water."
"Don't worry, doubt I could either honestly." Red eyes flicked back to me as I folded up my dress shirt and set about loosening my underarmor, "I'm going to be magicking it into place then."
"Is that your answer to everything?"
I couldn't help but grin, "Yeah, pretty much." That got an eyeroll, so I continued, "Honestly, not all the time. But when I'm dropped into things like I was, without any equipment or even a boat, it's the only tool I've really got."
"Oh…" she glanced back over at me as I set my actual armor aside. The thing was actually pretty form fitting despite being damn good armor, it was a layered, magical derivative of spider silk and heavily enchanted metallic plating. … though come to think of it, I could probably swap out the plating for some serious magical plating now… hrm… that was something for later. I did have a brief moment of self-consciousness at being topless in front of a cute girl, but I pushed it aside, I had work to do.
Picking Prometheus back up, I began to scratch runes into my skin once more, just barely drawing blood, "It's not a big deal really, magic is sort of my thing. I just usually prefer using non magical methods."
Secret's eyes narrowed at me as blood welled up against my neck, "Should you be talking while you do that?"
"I could do this in my sleep," I boasted, though not untruthfully thank goodness, "But I've just got to be slow and deliberate about it. I'm going to be at this for a while longer."
She raised an eyebrow at me, "Okay… so… what do I do while you do… whatever it is you're doing?"
"Relax? Once I'm done with this I'll need to recharge, and then we can work on getting out of the Underworld. It'll be easier to hide you in Creation than here, and that's definitely where I'm headed."
Covering her mouth in thought, she considered it before nodding, "Okay."
She stood, dusting herself off and looking around, "Is… there anything to do?"
"Well, if you look to your left you'll see abso-fuckin-lutely-nothin~, and if you look to your right, you'll see oodles and oodles of nothin~. And so on and so forth and sundry things." Now that got me another eye roll, though a little smile appeared accompanied it. But I continued, "Honestly, not really. Sorry."
"No, it's okay," she waved it off before looking away and grumbling, "I'll figure something out."
And with that, a little quiet fell over the two of us. I worked steadily, scratching runes into my neck and torso, blood welling up from each one in turn. Had to be careful around the stomach region though. I was sufficiently ticklish and the tip of the knife was sufficiently light to make it hard not to screw things up. Sure, it stung just a bit after the cuts, but the initial movements didn't really hurt, like cutting yourself shaving.
Still, the time passed quickly for me, even though Secret ended up having to spend nearly an hour faffing about. She got all of her limited stuff out of her boat and moved over, had explored the entirety of the Ice Ice Baby, all two areas of it, had looked out over the water from each of the railings, and had eventually settled in to watch me work. Hugging her knees to her chest loosely.
"Right," I murmured, looking over all of the runes carefully in the reflection of my watch, ignoring the little rivulets of blood that had seeped from the twenty or so runes carved into my skin, "That should do it."
"What, is it time to light yourself on fire?" Secret muttered, scowling just a bit. It wasn't mean, but the lack of anything to do was obviously bugging her.
"Pretty much." I agreed with a good natured smile, folding Prometheus knife back into place and setting the lighter down beside me. Pressing my fists together such that my knuckles interlocked, I settled in for my spell, starting to forge the imago, "This will take a while, though at very least it'll be more interesting to watch."
"Really?" there was a fair bit of snark and disbelief in her tone, but also a bit of hope.
I just smiled, closing my eyes and focusing inward, and knowing that a glowing circle had formed in the air behind me.
Words that were simultaneously meaningless and full of purpose quietly came from my mouth as I described the magic I was working in my head. My Nimbus, the interaction between my Pattern and the world around me, began to flare into visibility. Deep green circuitry traced itself into the air, describing the interactions my magic and the mechanisms of the world, creating a circuit-board from power…
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Life>, #Arcanum<Death>, #Practice<Patterning>;" The magic was far from done though, the rough patterns of the circuitry began to interlock and fold back in on themselves, creating circles of circuitry and runes, building a clockwork mechanism of circuitry from my power. It wasn't literal, but nor was it entirely metaphorical, Awakened magic was weird like that. But this was how I used my magic, how I connected my will to the world and enacted it. I was a mechanism in a greater machine, and by turning my wheels, I could shift the gears of the world, "Yantra(Mantra, Mandala, Sacrament) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Motonic Conversion."
11 Dice = 1 8 4 8 1 4 1 3 4 8 7 = 3 Successes
Blood welled up from the numerous runes on my body as the spell formed around and within me. The blood was the oil for the gears and mechanisms of reality, acting as a lubricant to ease the new connection I was creating between myself and Mana. Even then, the magic settled into place in and around my Pattern with a jerking lurch, like a new transmission getting shoved into place in a moving car.
The metaphorical engine of my soul that let me use Mana sputtered and tried to stall as I connected the jury-rigged system to it, but then the blood welling up from the runes burned, puffing away in bursts of black and white flames as I frayed myself and sacrificed the blood to jumpstart both engines, each puff of blood burned setting the metaphysical pistons to churning.
Something inside me ground, metaphorical gears and circuitry slipping and burning.
Vitae surged through the gear-circuits that interacted with the outside world and my own internal one for just a moment before–
Relief.
I let out a little sigh as the gears caught and turned, power jumping from one circuit to another at a measured, easy pace. I relaxed, feeling sort of empty, but not in a hungry or aching sort of way… it was weird, but not unpleasant. It was… almost heady… this was like an upper tier Hallow mixed with a Supernal Verge, it was like… like the atmosphere of the longtime sanctuary of an elder Vampire… there was just so much power in the air compared to what I was used to… I hadn't noticed earlier because it wasn't something I could use but now…
It was like drowning… but in air? Or power. It's hard to convey in words. The power was sickly sweet… or… or like drowning in Vitae…
HUNGER
Something in me, something dark and powerful and that I'd thought long quiet, made itself known. And I shuddered. I wasn't too surprised that it had stirred that old addiction, the underworld's mana was strikingly similar to that of a Vampire's Vitae, it's why I'd been able to design the spell in the first place. But… well, it was an unpleasant reminder. Even if I intellectually knew the addiction could never go away, Vitae's temptation never fades.
"Did it work?"
The soft, feminine voice tore me from my unpleasant musings. Giving my head a little shake, I responded, "Yeah, gimme a sec to adust and I'll get the boat a goin'."
I straightened out, cracking my back before pushing myself to my feet. Oh wow, same position for way too long. That was uncomfortable.
And from the look Secret gave me, completely audible, "Ew."
"I will actually second that, no matter how satisfying it was." I agreed, giving myself a little twist, and a cascade of little pops going through me. "… ow."
Picking up my pocket square and unfolding the handkerchief, I began to dab away at the blood still on my skin. I was quite thankful that my pants were a material that didn't stain because of blood and that the handkerchief was enchanted to consume stuff. The handkerchief was meant for cleaning up rituals, exactly like this one. Can thank working with vampires for both of those. "Gotta admit though," I started in amusement, "Little surprised you found the pops of joints disgusting, but not the fact that I have numerous runes weeping blood."
My companion just rolled her eyes, "I'm an Abyssal, blood comes with the territory."
Chuckling quietly to myself and satisfied with the cleanliness of my torso, I set my pocket square to the side and picked up my vest, "Which way are we going?"
"East by North East," Secret said with surprising surety as she stood, before looking away, "Mostly. I… don't really have a goal other than…" she made a vague gesture, scowling slightly, "Away."
"Fair enough." I admitted, tugging my armored vest back on over my head and tucking it into my pants, "Away from the Deathlords, away from the craziness, away."
Relief washed over her face at the understanding, "Yeah…"
I smiled, slipping my purple button-up shirt back on and tucking it in around my vest. "We'll figure out the rest when we get there. Land first. Then a Shadowland, then Creation."
"How will we do that?" she asked, her head tilting to the side slightly as I slipped my more stylish vest back on and buttoning it up. For the briefest of moments I felt like Eva Unit 01 or the Incredible Hulk what with the purple and green contrast. But the familiar and entertaining feeling passed quickly, "I'll only sort of know the area and we can't just wander around, what with you needing food and everything."
"I'll throw together another spell to make it work." Now that I knew where I was and could regain mana, I could set up a serious tracking spell to find a Shadowland. I could have bothered with a tie at this point, but I decided against it. Creation had a more Asian aesthetic… I might have to change outfits entirely to fit in better really.
That got me a look of disbelief though, her hands on her hips, "Wait, seriously?"
"Mhm?" I grunted, before throwing on my suit jacket and buttoning it up.
I could see the thoughts going through her head as she glanced at the boat, then back behind it, thinking of the spell I'd obviously used to propel myself, then her eyes focused on my lips… heh, looks like I wasn't as subtle with the universal language as I'd thought. Finally, as I shrugged on my overcoat, Secret asked incredulously, "… just how many spells do you know?"
"Can't talk, casting." A quick snap of my foot sent Prometheus flying upwards into my ready hand as I formed the spell, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Matter>, #Practice(Ruling) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Tool) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Bending."
9 Dice = 7 5 7 (9 8 7) 4 6 3 6 (9 3) = 3 Successes ; Wisdom (2 successes) vs Paradox (0 Successes) (
The spell settled into place once more, the runes on the ship lighting up as I took control of the water around the ship. A sweep of my hand caused the water beneath Secret's rowboat to lift like a bowl… the water level beneath it rising above the railing of the Ice Ice Baby. I called it bending, and I moved like I was doing so, but I didn't actually need to do so to perform the actions, but I was, admittedly a pretty physical caster. I always visualized ongoing magics like this as augmented reality effects, and that my manipulations were like adjusting the runes in my vision to do so like it was some sort of super advanced holodeck or omnitool sort of shit.
A twist of my wrist, and the tiny little sailboat was gently dumped out onto the deck. Letting the pseudopod of water collapse back into the otherwise still ocean I shifted my stance and lowered one hand while raising the other, propelling the boat once more, easing it in the direction Secret had indicated.
It was… quiet. Now that I'd realized where I was… it really sort of struck home just how quiet everything was. No waves. No wind. No… nothing. The sky was a pale blue, and the sun wasn't bright… I'd barely even noticed it…
I glanced over to the east. It was barely visible with my Mage Sight opened, but…
Revelation: 2 Dice = 1 (10 9) = 2 Successes
The enormous clockwork thing of lanterns and gears and Incan-like design that hung in the sky was… old. Like… horrifyingly, absurdly, impossibly old. Cue yo' moma jokes. I…. okay, I exaggerate a little there, but the thing was already aged like not so fine wine when human civilization as I knew it was just taking its first toddling steps. There was a weight to the thing in its years, and holy crap was it sobering. Not so much as seeing that weight of years in a person-shaped-thing, no, but still.
This was the land of the dead… and now that I was aware of it, I couldn't not be aware of it. I was too in tune with Death, too studied in the arts of the Dead, to just ignore it.
To be frank, it was irritating, like the tingle of pins and needles or that feeling of needing to pop a joint but the damn thing refusing to do so. Just all over. The living just weren't welcome here, not really. And some part of me, some part of my soul, remembered the taste of Vitae, the flavor of the Abyss as it entwined with my Awakened soul…
"So…"
I shook the thoughts off like a wet dog. It wasn't a productive line of thinking, not right now. I'd contemplate it more when we were safe and I had ready access to food and water. I looked over at Secret, "Yeeesssss?"
The pale young woman sat on the edge of the railing, her legs loosely crossed as her arms rested in her lap, "What got you sent to the Underworld?"
"Magic." Oh it was fun to be cheeky. But I smiled, "More seriously, it was a spell by my boss. It…" my eyes flicked about, taking in the surprisingly… calm? Serene? Grim scenery. "Well… it worked technically. But this isn't where I expected to end up at all."
"Where did you expect to end up?"
"Not the Underworld." I said with a grin. I looked over at her, "Okay, my turn. Why'd you leave the Deathlords? I don't know much about them other than that they're abominably powerful ghosts that rule the Underworld."
Well, I did, but the Underworld of Creation and its accompanying horrific masters had never been my strong suit.
"I… well…" she paused, looking down at the icy deck, "I… I've been on a training montage with a number of the Deathlords… I'm… honestly not all that good of an Abyssal. I did get a bit stronger but… the Deathlords, particularly the Lion… I got to see how… terrible they were." Her hand slid to clasp the small circlet hanging from her neck, squeezing it tightly for comfort as a very small, and a very scared look took over her face for just an instant, "And I just… I was headed back to Skullstone but… I just couldn't go along with it anymore."
My heart went out to the young woman, a little ache in my chest. I never liked to see people suffer, I was a bleeding heart through and through, but I had a weakness for attractive women. Gently, I prompted, "Bad?"
"Really bad."
I cringed slightly, it was more the tone than anything else, along with the look on her face. That conversation line was over.
"What about you?" she asked, obviously changing the subject, "Why did you let your master use a spell like that?"
"Because I asked her to." I paused, "Well… sort of. She made an offer to me, she'd teach me some magic and enable me to help people in a major, lasting, significant way. And in a lot of ways, that thing is my duty. She's really just the enabler, she's making it possible for me to do something I'd do anyways."
A puzzled expression crossed Secret's pale face, "What's that?"
"Find a particular big and nasty thing and punch it right in the schnoz. Repeatedly." I said with a grin. The enormity of the task didn't mean I couldn't be cheerful about it. I considered a thought for a moment before glancing over at her with a more neutral expression, "And I don't mind telling you, but I don't think the name means anything to you. And if I do, you've gotta promise not to bring it up unless I do, it could be risky."
"Really?"
"If it's even a quarter as entrenched as I expect, let alone as I fear, then yeah. It could be listening in with stuff like animals or spirits or structures. And I don't want to draw attention to myself just yet." Or ever, if I could help it. This world was insanely overpowered at its higher end, and while I could handle myself, I couldn't do anything like tank a perfectly accurate infinite damage attack.
And no, no part of that description is hyperbole at all. Perfectly accurate, infinite damage attack.
"But… you're willing to tell me…?"
I shrugged, "If there's anywhere we're safe from it listening in, it's here and now." If only for the fact that there was nothing interesting around for it to expend the resources and infrastructure to monitor the area.
Secret, bless her little necrotically infused heart, actually considered that for a moment. Her hand cupping her chin in thought as she scowled at the deck of the Ice Ice Baby. Then she raised her red eyes to meet my own gray green ones, pointing a pale finger at me, "Tell me. Because if anything sounds like a major plot point, that's it."
Okay, now that made me smile, "It's commonly known as the God Machine," and there was no recognition in her face at that, "It goes by a lot of names though, when it's given one."
Secret recrossed her legs, shifting in place on the railing as she puzzled over that, "Yeah… I've never heard of it… what is it?"
"About as bad as any of the Deathlords… maybe a particularly active Neverborn… it depends on how long it's had time to build itself up here. But it's subtle…" I paused, glancing over at her, "A lot like your former boss."
That made her pause, shuddering and looking away. "That's… bad…"
"Just a smidge, yeah."
"Do…" she stopped, hesitating for a moment to reorder her thoughts, "What do you need to do?"
"Figure out where to start looking," I said with a shrug.
She gave me an incredulous look at that, "… really?"
"Really. I'll figure it out. I know what to look for in the generalities."
"Like what?"
"Human sacrificial systems, certain formations of geomantic magic, certain forms of spiritual entities…" I paused as it sort of clicked, "… huh… the damn thing might actually be a Primordial…"
Secret somehow managed to blanch at the thought, "Seriously?"
"Yeah, it could take any number of forms really, it might be pretending to be a Neverborn or be integrated into the Loom of Fate, or a part of the geomantic systems of the world in some other fashion." Honestly, the God Machine was almost like an infection or a parasite in the geomantic systems of the world, which could mean it could be in any number of places… that was problematic. I needed to find some instances of its smaller workings and start tracing them back towards its central networking and command / control nodes… hrm… "But honestly it's very similar to a Primordial, what with having subsidiary existences and a distributed form as well as a Jouten."
"A what?"
"World body." I explained, "It's a kind of weird concept to wrap your head around in its entirety. But Creation's main form is either built from or built atop of or otherwise outright is Gaia's primary Jouten."
"Creation is a Primordial?!" she half shrieked.
"Sort of. Like I said, it's complex." That and the lore was sort of inconsistent and I didn't know what was true here and what wasn't.
It took her a moment of unhappy contemplation to shake that off, hugging herself around the waist. I'd have put a hand on her shoulder or otherwise provided some sort of comfort, but I was still moving the boat forward across the still sea of the underworld and couldn't move much. Eventually though, she shook it off, "Ugh… just how many points did you sink in Lore to know this stuff?"
"Lore and Occult thank you very much," metaphorically speaking at least, "But not as much as I'd have liked. I'm woefully out of date and vague on far too many points." It was interesting that she was at least tangentially aware of the system the Exalted world had run off of in the games, just like she and others had been in the comic. That merited study entirely on its own.
A small, teasing smile crossed her face at that, "What, didn't use your Excellencies?"
"Can't~" I said with a fair bit of cheer. Mind you, god I wanted some of those. Using raw magic efficiently and instinctively to massively enhance yourself without any chance of failure? Sign me the fuck up.
That made her red eyes narrow, "Why not? You're a sorcerer, why wouldn't you have an Occult excellency?"
"Because I'm not an Exalt?" She really hadn't picked up on that what with the lack of caste mark of a Celestial Exalted or the anima flux of a Dragon Blooded? She was a dork.
Her eyelids fluttered a few times as she blinked rapidly, "Wait, what?"
"I'm a mortal."
…
"WHAT?!"
Travel
"Mmn…"
I glanced over at Secret briefly, finding her pale face scrunching up as she shifted in place. A small smile crossed my face before I smoothed it away and returned to my task.
"I would say welcome back to the land of the living, but we're in the Underworld so…" I paused in my efforts to shrug. A small groan came from the pale young woman, making me glance at her, "You okay?"
"Yes," she grumbled, red eyes opening to give me a small glare as she pushed her hair out of her face, "That joke was just so bad it hurt."
I chuckled in spite of myself at the snark, grinning as I returned to my work, "Why thank you."
"It wasn't a compliment," Secret muttered, though she looked at me in confusion, "What… are you doing?"
"Magic."
She just raised an eyebrow at me and I smiled, "See, I like magic, so I'm doing magic so I can put magic in my magic so I can magic while I magic."
The look she gave me at that very eloquently conveyed 'What the fuck is this crazy person talking about?' I laughed, so hard.
"Um…"
"I'm joking…" I said through the chuckles before returning to scratching runes onto my skin, "Mostly at least. What I said is technically correct, if totally unhelpful." I paused, adjusting the angle of my watch face and turning my face a few times, checking the rune on my cheek for accuracy. Satisfied, I brought the knife of Prometheus up and carefully began to scratch the lines of the next rune onto my forehead, "See, when the magic brought me here, I didn't know where I was at first, I just knew the… essence around me felt weird." Whoop, almost said mana. Wrong setting. Same basic stuff it seems, but different terminology. "I wasn't able to use it, so I've been trying to be sparing with my magic. But once I realized you were an Abyssal, it clicked. We're in the Underworld, all of the essence is aspected to death and at least partially hostile to living beings like myself."
Secret shifted uncomfortably as she moved to a sitting position on the deck of the Ice Ice Baby. But I continued, "So, since I need motes to actually do anything useful and have any chance of surviving in the Underworld, I need to be able to regain motes… which is what this," I paused to indicate the scratches I was putting into my skin, "Is all about. Allowing me to use all of the power in the air around me, sort of like how you do, just on a massively lesser scale."
While my personal reserves of mana capped out at somewhere right around twelve or so 'units', that felt like it was less than she had in her body. And let's just ignore the fact that she had over twice that in her aura. It wasn't visible to the naked eye right now, but I could just see the power coiling around her like a shadowy flame. And from what I knew, she was comparatively weak. She was still young by a normal person's reckoning, let alone that of an Exalted.
"You can do that?"
"Mhm… well, probably." I admitted with a little shrug, still carefully scratching at my skin with the tip of Prometheus' folding out blade.
"Wait, probably?"
"If I'm wrong and I can't, then I'm going to die of starvation or thirst pretty quickly unless you can help me out there." I glanced at Secret, finding her looking distinctly uncomfortable at that, "But I have a feeling you can't?"
"Not really. There's… not much out here to eat."
"It's okay, I kind of figured. If I get this wrong, I've got enough power to try it a few more times before I have to buckle down and just get us somewhere else."
Pale fingers pressed to equally pale lips as Secret scowled briefly down at the deck of the ship in contemplation. I was able to watch the emotions flit across her face as she did, scratching further runes into my skin while she thought.
Her eyes flicked to the side into nothingness and she briefly chewed on her knuckle before looking back to me, "What all is involved in this?"
"I keep scratching myself up for a bit, then say some funny words that probably mean jack diddly to you…" I paused as a thought occurred to me, "Probably catch on fire for a little bit, and then I can use Death Essence alongside more normal energies for a while."
"Catch fire-?" she squeaked.
A small chuckle escaped me, "Just a little bit. A teensy bit of immolation."
"Oh yes, because that makes it so much better."
I shrugged, "To be honest, I'm not sure it'll happen at all. See, I know what's going to be happening metaphysically, at least I'm pretty sure. But I'm rushing a bit so I'm not completely sure what'll happen physically." Finishing with the runes on my face, I set Prometheus down and began to work my coat and suit jacket off.
"Um… what are you doing?"
"I've got to put some more runes on my chest and stomach," a quick snap of my wrists and I folded the overcoat a few times before setting it on the deck beside me. A smirk found itself on my face, "And magical I may be, but I can't exactly do it through my clothes."
My jacket soon joined the coat, though I took a moment to pull my pocket square out and set it aside for clean up later. Soon though, I was unclasping my dark green vest, the heavily pocketed thing joining my jacket before I began to work on my purple dress shirt. Secret stared for just a moment before looking away in embarrassment, "So-… what am I supposed to do while you get all slicy dicy?"
"If you can manage it, pulling your boat up here or otherwise breaking it down and getting the pieces on this one will save me some time and work."
Secret scowled out over the side of my boat at the top of her smaller ships mast, the only part of it visible over the railing. After a moment, she morosely admitted, "I don't think I can pull that thing out of the water."
"Don't worry, doubt I could either honestly." Red eyes flicked back to me as I folded up my dress shirt and set about loosening my underarmor, "I'm going to be magicking it into place then."
"Is that your answer to everything?"
I couldn't help but grin, "Yeah, pretty much." That got an eyeroll, so I continued, "Honestly, not all the time. But when I'm dropped into things like I was, without any equipment or even a boat, it's the only tool I've really got."
"Oh…" she glanced back over at me as I set my actual armor aside. The thing was actually pretty form fitting despite being damn good armor, it was a layered, magical derivative of spider silk and heavily enchanted metallic plating. … though come to think of it, I could probably swap out the plating for some serious magical plating now… hrm… that was something for later. I did have a brief moment of self-consciousness at being topless in front of a cute girl, but I pushed it aside, I had work to do.
Picking Prometheus back up, I began to scratch runes into my skin once more, just barely drawing blood, "It's not a big deal really, magic is sort of my thing. I just usually prefer using non magical methods."
Secret's eyes narrowed at me as blood welled up against my neck, "Should you be talking while you do that?"
"I could do this in my sleep," I boasted, though not untruthfully thank goodness, "But I've just got to be slow and deliberate about it. I'm going to be at this for a while longer."
She raised an eyebrow at me, "Okay… so… what do I do while you do… whatever it is you're doing?"
"Relax? Once I'm done with this I'll need to recharge, and then we can work on getting out of the Underworld. It'll be easier to hide you in Creation than here, and that's definitely where I'm headed."
Covering her mouth in thought, she considered it before nodding, "Okay."
She stood, dusting herself off and looking around, "Is… there anything to do?"
"Well, if you look to your left you'll see abso-fuckin-lutely-nothin~, and if you look to your right, you'll see oodles and oodles of nothin~. And so on and so forth and sundry things." Now that got me another eye roll, though a little smile appeared accompanied it. But I continued, "Honestly, not really. Sorry."
"No, it's okay," she waved it off before looking away and grumbling, "I'll figure something out."
And with that, a little quiet fell over the two of us. I worked steadily, scratching runes into my neck and torso, blood welling up from each one in turn. Had to be careful around the stomach region though. I was sufficiently ticklish and the tip of the knife was sufficiently light to make it hard not to screw things up. Sure, it stung just a bit after the cuts, but the initial movements didn't really hurt, like cutting yourself shaving.
Still, the time passed quickly for me, even though Secret ended up having to spend nearly an hour faffing about. She got all of her limited stuff out of her boat and moved over, had explored the entirety of the Ice Ice Baby, all two areas of it, had looked out over the water from each of the railings, and had eventually settled in to watch me work. Hugging her knees to her chest loosely.
"Right," I murmured, looking over all of the runes carefully in the reflection of my watch, ignoring the little rivulets of blood that had seeped from the twenty or so runes carved into my skin, "That should do it."
"What, is it time to light yourself on fire?" Secret muttered, scowling just a bit. It wasn't mean, but the lack of anything to do was obviously bugging her.
"Pretty much." I agreed with a good natured smile, folding Prometheus knife back into place and setting the lighter down beside me. Pressing my fists together such that my knuckles interlocked, I settled in for my spell, starting to forge the imago, "This will take a while, though at very least it'll be more interesting to watch."
"Really?" there was a fair bit of snark and disbelief in her tone, but also a bit of hope.
I just smiled, closing my eyes and focusing inward, and knowing that a glowing circle had formed in the air behind me.
Words that were simultaneously meaningless and full of purpose quietly came from my mouth as I described the magic I was working in my head. My Nimbus, the interaction between my Pattern and the world around me, began to flare into visibility. Deep green circuitry traced itself into the air, describing the interactions my magic and the mechanisms of the world, creating a circuit-board from power…
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Life>, #Arcanum<Death>, #Practice<Patterning>;" The magic was far from done though, the rough patterns of the circuitry began to interlock and fold back in on themselves, creating circles of circuitry and runes, building a clockwork mechanism of circuitry from my power. It wasn't literal, but nor was it entirely metaphorical, Awakened magic was weird like that. But this was how I used my magic, how I connected my will to the world and enacted it. I was a mechanism in a greater machine, and by turning my wheels, I could shift the gears of the world, "Yantra(Mantra, Mandala, Sacrament) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Motonic Conversion."
11 Dice = 1 8 4 8 1 4 1 3 4 8 7 = 3 Successes
Blood welled up from the numerous runes on my body as the spell formed around and within me. The blood was the oil for the gears and mechanisms of reality, acting as a lubricant to ease the new connection I was creating between myself and Mana. Even then, the magic settled into place in and around my Pattern with a jerking lurch, like a new transmission getting shoved into place in a moving car.
The metaphorical engine of my soul that let me use Mana sputtered and tried to stall as I connected the jury-rigged system to it, but then the blood welling up from the runes burned, puffing away in bursts of black and white flames as I frayed myself and sacrificed the blood to jumpstart both engines, each puff of blood burned setting the metaphysical pistons to churning.
Something inside me ground, metaphorical gears and circuitry slipping and burning.
Vitae surged through the gear-circuits that interacted with the outside world and my own internal one for just a moment before–
Relief.
I let out a little sigh as the gears caught and turned, power jumping from one circuit to another at a measured, easy pace. I relaxed, feeling sort of empty, but not in a hungry or aching sort of way… it was weird, but not unpleasant. It was… almost heady… this was like an upper tier Hallow mixed with a Supernal Verge, it was like… like the atmosphere of the longtime sanctuary of an elder Vampire… there was just so much power in the air compared to what I was used to… I hadn't noticed earlier because it wasn't something I could use but now…
It was like drowning… but in air? Or power. It's hard to convey in words. The power was sickly sweet… or… or like drowning in Vitae…
HUNGER
Something in me, something dark and powerful and that I'd thought long quiet, made itself known. And I shuddered. I wasn't too surprised that it had stirred that old addiction, the underworld's mana was strikingly similar to that of a Vampire's Vitae, it's why I'd been able to design the spell in the first place. But… well, it was an unpleasant reminder. Even if I intellectually knew the addiction could never go away, Vitae's temptation never fades.
"Did it work?"
The soft, feminine voice tore me from my unpleasant musings. Giving my head a little shake, I responded, "Yeah, gimme a sec to adust and I'll get the boat a goin'."
I straightened out, cracking my back before pushing myself to my feet. Oh wow, same position for way too long. That was uncomfortable.
And from the look Secret gave me, completely audible, "Ew."
"I will actually second that, no matter how satisfying it was." I agreed, giving myself a little twist, and a cascade of little pops going through me. "… ow."
Picking up my pocket square and unfolding the handkerchief, I began to dab away at the blood still on my skin. I was quite thankful that my pants were a material that didn't stain because of blood and that the handkerchief was enchanted to consume stuff. The handkerchief was meant for cleaning up rituals, exactly like this one. Can thank working with vampires for both of those. "Gotta admit though," I started in amusement, "Little surprised you found the pops of joints disgusting, but not the fact that I have numerous runes weeping blood."
My companion just rolled her eyes, "I'm an Abyssal, blood comes with the territory."
Chuckling quietly to myself and satisfied with the cleanliness of my torso, I set my pocket square to the side and picked up my vest, "Which way are we going?"
"East by North East," Secret said with surprising surety as she stood, before looking away, "Mostly. I… don't really have a goal other than…" she made a vague gesture, scowling slightly, "Away."
"Fair enough." I admitted, tugging my armored vest back on over my head and tucking it into my pants, "Away from the Deathlords, away from the craziness, away."
Relief washed over her face at the understanding, "Yeah…"
I smiled, slipping my purple button-up shirt back on and tucking it in around my vest. "We'll figure out the rest when we get there. Land first. Then a Shadowland, then Creation."
"How will we do that?" she asked, her head tilting to the side slightly as I slipped my more stylish vest back on and buttoning it up. For the briefest of moments I felt like Eva Unit 01 or the Incredible Hulk what with the purple and green contrast. But the familiar and entertaining feeling passed quickly, "I'll only sort of know the area and we can't just wander around, what with you needing food and everything."
"I'll throw together another spell to make it work." Now that I knew where I was and could regain mana, I could set up a serious tracking spell to find a Shadowland. I could have bothered with a tie at this point, but I decided against it. Creation had a more Asian aesthetic… I might have to change outfits entirely to fit in better really.
That got me a look of disbelief though, her hands on her hips, "Wait, seriously?"
"Mhm?" I grunted, before throwing on my suit jacket and buttoning it up.
I could see the thoughts going through her head as she glanced at the boat, then back behind it, thinking of the spell I'd obviously used to propel myself, then her eyes focused on my lips… heh, looks like I wasn't as subtle with the universal language as I'd thought. Finally, as I shrugged on my overcoat, Secret asked incredulously, "… just how many spells do you know?"
"Can't talk, casting." A quick snap of my foot sent Prometheus flying upwards into my ready hand as I formed the spell, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Matter>, #Practice(Ruling) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Tool) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Bending."
9 Dice = 7 5 7 (9 8 7) 4 6 3 6 (9 3) = 3 Successes ; Wisdom (2 successes) vs Paradox (0 Successes) (
The spell settled into place once more, the runes on the ship lighting up as I took control of the water around the ship. A sweep of my hand caused the water beneath Secret's rowboat to lift like a bowl… the water level beneath it rising above the railing of the Ice Ice Baby. I called it bending, and I moved like I was doing so, but I didn't actually need to do so to perform the actions, but I was, admittedly a pretty physical caster. I always visualized ongoing magics like this as augmented reality effects, and that my manipulations were like adjusting the runes in my vision to do so like it was some sort of super advanced holodeck or omnitool sort of shit.
A twist of my wrist, and the tiny little sailboat was gently dumped out onto the deck. Letting the pseudopod of water collapse back into the otherwise still ocean I shifted my stance and lowered one hand while raising the other, propelling the boat once more, easing it in the direction Secret had indicated.
It was… quiet. Now that I'd realized where I was… it really sort of struck home just how quiet everything was. No waves. No wind. No… nothing. The sky was a pale blue, and the sun wasn't bright… I'd barely even noticed it…
I glanced over to the east. It was barely visible with my Mage Sight opened, but…
Revelation: 2 Dice = 1 (10 9) = 2 Successes
The enormous clockwork thing of lanterns and gears and Incan-like design that hung in the sky was… old. Like… horrifyingly, absurdly, impossibly old. Cue yo' moma jokes. I…. okay, I exaggerate a little there, but the thing was already aged like not so fine wine when human civilization as I knew it was just taking its first toddling steps. There was a weight to the thing in its years, and holy crap was it sobering. Not so much as seeing that weight of years in a person-shaped-thing, no, but still.
This was the land of the dead… and now that I was aware of it, I couldn't not be aware of it. I was too in tune with Death, too studied in the arts of the Dead, to just ignore it.
To be frank, it was irritating, like the tingle of pins and needles or that feeling of needing to pop a joint but the damn thing refusing to do so. Just all over. The living just weren't welcome here, not really. And some part of me, some part of my soul, remembered the taste of Vitae, the flavor of the Abyss as it entwined with my Awakened soul…
"So…"
I shook the thoughts off like a wet dog. It wasn't a productive line of thinking, not right now. I'd contemplate it more when we were safe and I had ready access to food and water. I looked over at Secret, "Yeeesssss?"
The pale young woman sat on the edge of the railing, her legs loosely crossed as her arms rested in her lap, "What got you sent to the Underworld?"
"Magic." Oh it was fun to be cheeky. But I smiled, "More seriously, it was a spell by my boss. It…" my eyes flicked about, taking in the surprisingly… calm? Serene? Grim scenery. "Well… it worked technically. But this isn't where I expected to end up at all."
"Where did you expect to end up?"
"Not the Underworld." I said with a grin. I looked over at her, "Okay, my turn. Why'd you leave the Deathlords? I don't know much about them other than that they're abominably powerful ghosts that rule the Underworld."
Well, I did, but the Underworld of Creation and its accompanying horrific masters had never been my strong suit.
"I… well…" she paused, looking down at the icy deck, "I… I've been on a training montage with a number of the Deathlords… I'm… honestly not all that good of an Abyssal. I did get a bit stronger but… the Deathlords, particularly the Lion… I got to see how… terrible they were." Her hand slid to clasp the small circlet hanging from her neck, squeezing it tightly for comfort as a very small, and a very scared look took over her face for just an instant, "And I just… I was headed back to Skullstone but… I just couldn't go along with it anymore."
My heart went out to the young woman, a little ache in my chest. I never liked to see people suffer, I was a bleeding heart through and through, but I had a weakness for attractive women. Gently, I prompted, "Bad?"
"Really bad."
I cringed slightly, it was more the tone than anything else, along with the look on her face. That conversation line was over.
"What about you?" she asked, obviously changing the subject, "Why did you let your master use a spell like that?"
"Because I asked her to." I paused, "Well… sort of. She made an offer to me, she'd teach me some magic and enable me to help people in a major, lasting, significant way. And in a lot of ways, that thing is my duty. She's really just the enabler, she's making it possible for me to do something I'd do anyways."
A puzzled expression crossed Secret's pale face, "What's that?"
"Find a particular big and nasty thing and punch it right in the schnoz. Repeatedly." I said with a grin. The enormity of the task didn't mean I couldn't be cheerful about it. I considered a thought for a moment before glancing over at her with a more neutral expression, "And I don't mind telling you, but I don't think the name means anything to you. And if I do, you've gotta promise not to bring it up unless I do, it could be risky."
"Really?"
"If it's even a quarter as entrenched as I expect, let alone as I fear, then yeah. It could be listening in with stuff like animals or spirits or structures. And I don't want to draw attention to myself just yet." Or ever, if I could help it. This world was insanely overpowered at its higher end, and while I could handle myself, I couldn't do anything like tank a perfectly accurate infinite damage attack.
And no, no part of that description is hyperbole at all. Perfectly accurate, infinite damage attack.
"But… you're willing to tell me…?"
I shrugged, "If there's anywhere we're safe from it listening in, it's here and now." If only for the fact that there was nothing interesting around for it to expend the resources and infrastructure to monitor the area.
Secret, bless her little necrotically infused heart, actually considered that for a moment. Her hand cupping her chin in thought as she scowled at the deck of the Ice Ice Baby. Then she raised her red eyes to meet my own gray green ones, pointing a pale finger at me, "Tell me. Because if anything sounds like a major plot point, that's it."
Okay, now that made me smile, "It's commonly known as the God Machine," and there was no recognition in her face at that, "It goes by a lot of names though, when it's given one."
Secret recrossed her legs, shifting in place on the railing as she puzzled over that, "Yeah… I've never heard of it… what is it?"
"About as bad as any of the Deathlords… maybe a particularly active Neverborn… it depends on how long it's had time to build itself up here. But it's subtle…" I paused, glancing over at her, "A lot like your former boss."
That made her pause, shuddering and looking away. "That's… bad…"
"Just a smidge, yeah."
"Do…" she stopped, hesitating for a moment to reorder her thoughts, "What do you need to do?"
"Figure out where to start looking," I said with a shrug.
She gave me an incredulous look at that, "… really?"
"Really. I'll figure it out. I know what to look for in the generalities."
"Like what?"
"Human sacrificial systems, certain formations of geomantic magic, certain forms of spiritual entities…" I paused as it sort of clicked, "… huh… the damn thing might actually be a Primordial…"
Secret somehow managed to blanch at the thought, "Seriously?"
"Yeah, it could take any number of forms really, it might be pretending to be a Neverborn or be integrated into the Loom of Fate, or a part of the geomantic systems of the world in some other fashion." Honestly, the God Machine was almost like an infection or a parasite in the geomantic systems of the world, which could mean it could be in any number of places… that was problematic. I needed to find some instances of its smaller workings and start tracing them back towards its central networking and command / control nodes… hrm… "But honestly it's very similar to a Primordial, what with having subsidiary existences and a distributed form as well as a Jouten."
"A what?"
"World body." I explained, "It's a kind of weird concept to wrap your head around in its entirety. But Creation's main form is either built from or built atop of or otherwise outright is Gaia's primary Jouten."
"Creation is a Primordial?!" she half shrieked.
"Sort of. Like I said, it's complex." That and the lore was sort of inconsistent and I didn't know what was true here and what wasn't.
It took her a moment of unhappy contemplation to shake that off, hugging herself around the waist. I'd have put a hand on her shoulder or otherwise provided some sort of comfort, but I was still moving the boat forward across the still sea of the underworld and couldn't move much. Eventually though, she shook it off, "Ugh… just how many points did you sink in Lore to know this stuff?"
"Lore and Occult thank you very much," metaphorically speaking at least, "But not as much as I'd have liked. I'm woefully out of date and vague on far too many points." It was interesting that she was at least tangentially aware of the system the Exalted world had run off of in the games, just like she and others had been in the comic. That merited study entirely on its own.
A small, teasing smile crossed her face at that, "What, didn't use your Excellencies?"
"Can't~" I said with a fair bit of cheer. Mind you, god I wanted some of those. Using raw magic efficiently and instinctively to massively enhance yourself without any chance of failure? Sign me the fuck up.
That made her red eyes narrow, "Why not? You're a sorcerer, why wouldn't you have an Occult excellency?"
"Because I'm not an Exalt?" She really hadn't picked up on that what with the lack of caste mark of a Celestial Exalted or the anima flux of a Dragon Blooded? She was a dork.
Her eyelids fluttered a few times as she blinked rapidly, "Wait, what?"
"I'm a mortal."
…
"WHAT?!"
Last edited:
Ball 2 - Ding!
- Location
- Florida, United States
Body Control (7 Dice = (8 6) 1 2 (8 4) 5 4 7 = 2 Successes ; Will last one month. Extensive control of bodily functions. Requires 1/8th the normal amount of food, water, and air. Heartbeat operates at 1/8th speed. Heals at 8x speed.)
Tracking Ward (6 dice (8-again) = 1 5 3 (8 10 3) (9 4) (9 10 8 10 2) = 7 Successes ; Particularly powerful anti-death-scrying ward. Potency 6, duration 1 month)
Bending (Still operating. Allows moderate control and manipulation of inanimate liquids within ~20 yards of himself)
Motonic Conversion (Still operating. Allows absorbtion of death energies as a creature of death.
Tracking Ward (6 dice (8-again) = 1 5 3 (8 10 3) (9 4) (9 10 8 10 2) = 7 Successes ; Particularly powerful anti-death-scrying ward. Potency 6, duration 1 month)
Bending (Still operating. Allows moderate control and manipulation of inanimate liquids within ~20 yards of himself)
Motonic Conversion (Still operating. Allows absorbtion of death energies as a creature of death.
Ball 2
Ding!
I'd just flew in from outside existence and man my arms were tired.
Stamina + Athletics = 7 8 2 (10 1) 6 8 = 3 Successes
But I kept them up, maintaining the push of the spell.
We'd been sailing for a good while now, just a bit over two weeks. I'd cast a solidly powerful Body Control spell earlier to control my metabolism and body functions and reduce the amount of food and water I'd need, and I was thankful for that. I don't think I can drink the water even after removing the salt content, and straight up creating water from nothing was beyond me. But that wasn't something I wanted to test without some measure of a safety net.
Thankfully, Secret had a charm that removed her need to eat, though given the Abyssal Exaltation it was entirely possible for her to eat the local materials.
Perfect Recall: 7 Dice = 5 6 7 3 4 (10 10 6) 1 = 2 Successes
None of the books I'd read mentioned anything about the Underworld's food and the Abyssal's connection to such. But I hadn't read all if the books all the way through, so it's perfectly possible that even with magically perfect memory I wouldn't be able to remember anything about it. But given that living things couldn't subsist on the materials down here in the Underworld but Abyssals were expected to live down here, it was a logical assumption.
Gnosis + Death Arcanum vs Rank 4 Mystery
5 3 4 5 1 9 1
7 6 3 9 7 1 6
3 (10 8) 2 3 1 4 9 ; Mystery -1
2 3 5 8 3 9 4
4 4 2 1 (10 5) 8 9 ; Mystery -1
6 2 3 (10 8) 3 4 6 ; Mystery -1
7 9 2 (10 1) 2 5 5 ; Mystery -1
Corpse Needs No Food
Permanent enhancement. Doesn't need to eat. Unable to eat anything but lifeblood. Ingrained use of an effect. Built off of another effect.
+Incomplete Clue (2 Elements): Abyssal Charms
5 3 4 5 1 9 1
7 6 3 9 7 1 6
3 (10 8) 2 3 1 4 9 ; Mystery -1
2 3 5 8 3 9 4
4 4 2 1 (10 5) 8 9 ; Mystery -1
6 2 3 (10 8) 3 4 6 ; Mystery -1
7 9 2 (10 1) 2 5 5 ; Mystery -1
Corpse Needs No Food
Permanent enhancement. Doesn't need to eat. Unable to eat anything but lifeblood. Ingrained use of an effect. Built off of another effect.
+Incomplete Clue (2 Elements): Abyssal Charms
"Hey."
"Wa'sup?" I responded without turning as Secret approached from behind. She'd been taking the time to break down her boat a bit and store the stuff below deck.
"Any idea how much longer until we hit land?" The pale young woman came to a stop beside me, standing only a little bit shorter than my own marginal height of 5'6". She brushed her long, straight black hair back over an ear as her eyes scanned the mists around us, "It's pretty boring out here."
"Don't ask me," I shrugged slightly, "I can make the ship move but you're the one who actually has a map."
Not that I didn't agree with her. It was boring as all balls out here. Outside of the sun rising and falling, literally nothing had happened. Not even exaggerating, no wind, no waves except what I generated, no nothing. Just an endless dark sea and pale sky above our heads. I was making due by trying to extrapolate details about the various things I could see based on the information my Mage Sight could grant me.
Gnosis + Death Arcanum vs Rank 5 Mystery
1 4 1 6 (10 10 1)
2 6 8 (10 8) (10 3) ; Mystery -1
8 1 9 2 7
3 8 1 6 4
5 2 8 8 5 ; Mystery -1
9 5 2 (10 9) 6 ; Mystery -1
1 5 5 (10 10 10 4) 8 ; Mystery -1
Calender of Setesh
An ancient mechanism meant to turn the wheel of time in a consistent manner in the Underworld, which otherwise lacks true casualty. It moves the pale sun and stars of the Underworld and is fueled by prayer.
+1 Incomplete Clue (1 Element): Calander of Setesh
1 4 1 6 (10 10 1)
2 6 8 (10 8) (10 3) ; Mystery -1
8 1 9 2 7
3 8 1 6 4
5 2 8 8 5 ; Mystery -1
9 5 2 (10 9) 6 ; Mystery -1
1 5 5 (10 10 10 4) 8 ; Mystery -1
Calender of Setesh
An ancient mechanism meant to turn the wheel of time in a consistent manner in the Underworld, which otherwise lacks true casualty. It moves the pale sun and stars of the Underworld and is fueled by prayer.
+1 Incomplete Clue (1 Element): Calander of Setesh
"It's hard to know. I thought we'd have arrived by yesterday," she muttered defensively.
I could only shrug, "I could be aiming wrong, or there could be large scale currents that I'm not noticing, or we're not going as fast as we expect, or any number of things. I'm not too concerned just yet."
She glanced at me, "How are you okay with not drinking this long?"
"Magic."
That got an eyeroll even as I grinned, "But seriously, it's a spell that lets me control my physiology. If it goes on too long I can do a spell to recharge myself, but that's an inherently living spell and I don't want to risk cocking it up when I'm running on Death Essence." I wasn't mainlining the stuff thankfully, but it was still pretty risky to use death mana to power a spell meant to affect your living processes. Surprisingly, there was just so much of the stuff in the air around me that I was actually recharging slowly without opening myself to the power.
Good because it meant I didn't have to spend an hour doing fuck all to recharge my mana stores, bad news because holy shit that is a lot of power. These people operate on this? Just holy crap.
"Good point…" she murmured, touching her hand to her chin in thought. After a moment, she looked back at me, "Do you have any magic that could let you figure out how close we are?"
"Hrm… I could probably try…" It'd be a little bit of a stretch, with four spells running I was already just beyond the limits of my ability to maintain them. It'd be a brief little spell though, so it shouldn't be too much of a strain on me. With the spell to maintain the boat relinquished, I still had my metabolic control, motonic converter, bending, and the shielding spell hiding Secret running. But since I didn't have to worry so much about power now…
Letting my arms drop, the perpetual wave the Ice Ice Baby was riding on fell and the ship cruised to a stop. With a small grunt, I rolled my shoulders as I tried to build a spell in my head.
"Okay, so… let's see…" I bounced Prometheus in my hand a few times as I considered what I was trying to do, "In the Underworld so… hrm… not worth it to use a different spell."
Raising my watch, I focused on it, running power through the symbols painted on its face once more, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum <Mind>, #Practice<Knowing>; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Tool) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Find Thoughts."
8 dice = 9 3 3 2 8 5 (10 2) 6 = 3 Successes ; Wisdom 3 Successes vs Paradox 2 Successes
A little circuit-gear flared into existence around the face of the watch before fading as the magic took hold. The magic pinged even as I exempted Secret from the spell. The digital compass on my watch appearing and spinning briefly before locking on to the next nearest mind at… huh. I'd have thought…
My surprise must have shown on my face because Secret leaned over curiously, trying to get a better look at my watch, "What is it?"
"… um… how far away is the horizon?"
"Seven miles," Secret said, almost by rote, though she didn't seem all that surprised that I didn't know…? "That's how far the Pattern Spiders let people see before they start not putting as much detail, why?"
I'd asked because Creation, and likely the Underworld that based itself upon it, was flat. So the idea of a 'horizon' was strange. But it had to be true, otherwise you'd be able to see land from any distance, and even the likes of mountains from absurd distances. So what was holding it back aside from diffraction in the air? Literal fucking magic. It probably didn't come up as much in the other parts of Creation, but the West was a huge ocean… the horizon was probably a fair bit more important of a concept there… here. Hoo boy that's weird to think. Last place I was was basically just my world with a couple subtle differences, this was an entirely new world that had previously been fictional.
"The next closest mind is about eight miles thataway," I pointed with my other hand, just slightly off center from the direction we'd been traveling in.
Gonna… take some adjusting. Gotta admit.
"Oh… oh!" Realization hit her like a lightbulb, her pale face brightening as she started to beam, "Great! This is boring." Secret straightened out, crossing her arms as I raised my own once more, shifting the waters around us to start the ship moving.
A realization seemed to hit her and she spun back, waving her arms quickly, "Not that you're boring or anything! It's just–"
I couldn't help it, I laughed, "It's alright, I've been pretty boring. You've been nice company, but I'll be happy when we get to land as well."
We honestly hadn't been talking much. I'd taken the time to paint some runes onto her pale skin and enchant her with the best shielding technique I could come up with. That spell had worked astoundingly well, to the point that I don't think I'd be able to recreate it when it ran out in two weeks. Not as strong as it was at very least.
But outside of that and some mostly empty conversation about what the Underworld and the Deathlords were like, we were still mostly uncomfortable with another.
Well, she was understandably uncomfortable with me and I wasn't exactly sociable unless I rewrote my brain to be such. But with as many spells as I had running already, doing so would've been silly. She was adorable, but I wasn't particularly good at making friends.
Secret sighed, wrapping her arms around her waist loosely and looking out at the waters, "So how long until we get there?"
"A few hours," I guessed, I couldn't get a good gauge on how fast we were going right now without casting another spell, which was already a strain on my ability to hold the imago's in my head.
She nodded, "Good."
-oOo-
"Well that's a pretty place…" I murmured, looking over the island we were closing in on. Palms and tropical-seeming bushes near the coast, bleeding away to thicker forests the further in one went. I glanced at Secret, "Any idea what it is?"
"That's Lakshadi, it's… um… it's the home of Dragon King ghosts."
I blinked.
Then I blinked again, turning to look at Secret in confusion, "But… Dragon Kings have perfect reincarnation." It wasn't completely perfect, but when a Dragon King died, their soul was reborn in a hatchling. They started out completely feral, but as they aged they became more sane and regained more of their memories. Sure, without proper training and education they could remain feral functionally forever, and that was unfortunately natural state of them in the current times due to the sudden and terrible cataclysm that took out so many of their elders and population, they didn't have a population capable of educating the new ones… but still. "How the fuck do they have ghosts?"
"I… don't know?" she said hesitantly, glancing at me uncomfortably as she rubbed her arms before looking back at the island. It was big, stretching across most of our view with its small mountains and significant amount of forests… but pale forests. It was still in the Underworld, but it had a still and quiet beauty rather than a living and vital one… it was like a snowy field rather than a vibrant forest. Which let me tell you is weird as balls to see in a tropical style forest. "All they told me was that there were ancient ghosts that were like big lizards or little dragons and that they would be hostile…"
Staring at Secret in surprise for just a moment, I opened my mouth before closing it with a click and frowned at the island, "Fair enough."
"Hey!" the young woman bristled, "I can't know everything about the Underworld! You're the one with Occult five!"
"No, no, I understand. It's not your fault, I'm sorry if I gave that impression." I apologized, waving my stupidity off. It was extremely unfair to expect her to know everything about the setting, let alone something occult like that when even master scholars couldn't know a fraction of the things. "This bugs me, but that's because it goes against what I've learned. That just means that one of us is misinformed, and I'm definitely leaning towards me being wrong here. You've got an actual education in this stuff and I'm working off half remembered texts from years ago."
She frowned at me, grumbling, "Well it didn't sound like that."
My lips pressed together tightly and I sighed through my nose. Great, open mouth, insert foot. I'd been caught off guard by the whole 'Dragon King Ghost' revelation and made an ass out of myself. I didn't know if it was because my setting knowledge was incomplete or if the setting was different than I knew of or if something had been changed by the God Machine or what. But regardless, it just meant I needed to deal with it as it came, same as I had with Demons and Angels in the World of Darkness as well as my own abilities. One step at a time, do the math and all that.
"Sorry," I apologized again, at least a measure more contrite this time. "I'm just unhappy because I live or die based on my foreknowledge and ability to prepare. Mortals need to stack things in their favor to even have a chance. And being blindsided by things like this is terrifying." I could only have so many spells running and I was already pushing my limits. I could put up maybe two, maybe three more in a pinch before I started tearing myself apart with every casting or venting Abyss into my surroundings. Which would be bad. If I prepped improperly and got blindsided, I could get attacked in a way I wasn't prepared for and just torn to itty bitty bits, either by my own hubris or by whatever it was that was attacking.
"You sure don't look scared," she noted unhappily.
"Fear is the mind killer. And it's also about as helpful as a sack of rocks." The Ice Ice baby jerked slightly as we went over a sandbank I hadn't been able to see on our approach, but both Secret and I had good sea legs and didn't fall. I let out a breath, "Honestly, I can deal, but it was an unpleasant surprise. I'm sorry if it seemed like I was taking it out on you, that wasn't my intent at all. Even the knowledge that they're Dragon Kings is a huge help. Thank you."
Secret shuffled in place, the defensive anger bleeding into awkwardness as she glanced away from me. After a moment she muttered, "Apology accepted."
I sighed in relief as the Ice Ice Baby came slowly up onto the beach, beaching the ship on the beach, so we could beach while we beach and various other memes.
Letting my arms drop, I rubbed my aching shoulders with a hand. And now we were at land, potentially hostile land that could have terrible, horrifying things awaiting us.
Valor roll = 5 1 = Botch!
Hah… hahhhh… yeah, was not looking forward to this. I bit my lip glancing over at Secret and hoping that she might be willing to make the first move, but… if anything, she seemed even more worried than I was. Her hands were grasping her elbows as she stared out at the island we'd beached ourselves on, chewing her bottom lip as crimson eyes darted about…
Compassion = 10 7 3 3 = Success
Well fuck that noise. Clapping my hands together, I forced the cheer for her sake, "Well… let's go say hi then."
"But-!" Secret started, making me freeze and look at her quickly. And some part of me couldn't help but go 'What is it now?' "These… the Dragon Kings… they hate the Deathlords…"
I processed that for a moment before giving her a warm smile, "Good thing we're not associated with them then, hm?"
Secret opened her mouth, then closed it, seemingly reassured before that bled away with a sign of resignation, "That's nice and all, but I'm an Abyssal, there's no way they're going to believe that I'm not with the Deathlords."
While that was true, the same could be said of Mages not believing I was with the Vampires. I couldn't help a little grin at that, a measure of confidence returning to me, "Let me handle that part."
Walking up to the rail of the ice ship, I vaulted over it and dropped the half dozen feet to the sand, knees bending to absorb the shock. I could practically feel the sigh from her as she leaned over the railing, "Didn't you just say that you need to know what you're getting into in order to survive?"
That was completely true, but while I was worried and afraid, I also drew strength from the fact that someone needed to be strong for. If anything, her doubts reaffirmed my determination. I smiled up at her, "An unknown number of Dragon King ghosts are on the island with potentially antagonistic attitudes due to who you used to work for. First order of business is contacting them and determining how hostile they are. Second's determining their goals. And finally, giving them what they want in exchange for what we want."
"Which is?" she asked, vaulting over the railing herself, landing far more gracefully than I could have managed.
With a thought, I released the spell that allowed me to bend water into nothingness, freeing some space in my Pattern for another imago. "Not dying, and getting to Creation, hopefully in that order." I grinned just a bit at her.
"And how are we going to do any of that? I'm…" she hesitated for a moment before admitting, "I'm not that good at talking to people or fighting… or much of anything really…"
"Magic, magic, magic, and probably talking fancy words at ancient ghosts of learned dinosaur kings using magical crystal technology and mystically biologically engineered organisms."
And the kicker was that stuff like that made perfect sense in the Exalted lore.
That earned me a dry look, "… seriously?"
"Actually? Yes." I then proceeded to deliberately misinterpret what she was asking as I started walking onto the island, "Unless I continue to be misinformed, Dragon Kings are pseudo reptilian, a species of enlightened sages that use strange organic plant technology as well as crystal technology."
"That's not- ugh," she facepalmed before starting to walk after me, "I'm never going to get a straight answer from you, am I?"
"I'm pretty solid with mental and death based magics, ghosts might be dangerous but this is something I should be able to handle." I said, completely contradicting her prior question with an example. Should being the operative word here. I had no idea how my magics would interact with the local ghosts and I hoped that things would work smoothly without requiring magic. "But right off the bat? No, you're probably not. I like messing with people."
If they didn't… well…
Secret rolled her eyes, a little smile on her face, her grasp on her own elbows less of a death grip and more of a casual thing to do with her hands when she lacked pockets.
Prometheus slipped into my palm in a subtle, well-practiced motion.
If worst came to worst, I could always set things on fire.
-oOo-
… that looked surprisingly… human? Well, human-natured in construction. If I remembered correctly, Dragon Kings made structures with minimal use of right angles… but that thing was practically a mosque in design, though it was subtly different, it had a more hexagonal base… it was set at the end of a grassy path through pale palm trees… and behind it was a small… settlement? I wasn't entirely sure the proper terminology, but it was a moderately sized place with a decent sized Aztec-style pyramid, and a fair number of these towers about a hundred yards tall and about a quarter of that wide, with dozens of balconies along the outside… those are probably their apartments, the pyramids their temples on which they'd sacrifice people's hearts to the Unconquered Sun… this mosque and those like it scattered about the settlement… I didn't know. I couldn't remember anything like it from my readings. We'd been following the sight of them through the forest and path for a little while now. It was honestly quite beautiful, but it lacked the vibrant beauty it should have had, instead having that still and quiet beauty of a world of silence.
Oh, and there were about a dozen vaguely dinosaur like beings in robes walking to meet us on the path. They were surprisingly intimidating all considered.
"Hail!"
Not that I'd let something as trivial as that slow me down. Not when Secret was practically shaking beside me like a leaf. Metaphorically that is, she kept glancing at me, and then away, her body language very clearly expressing her desire to not be here. That and if I could meet Prometheans in discourse, I sure as hell could meet some Dragon Kings.
I breathed in, tracing the lines in my skin and soul with power as the spell formed, connecting to Prometheus as well as all of my limited knowledge of persuasion as we moved to meet the Dragon Kings, I was going to magically speak the truth.
Words of Truth = 7 dice = 8 5 5 9 (10 5) 7 8 = 4 Successes
There were three kinds of them approaching us. Two of them flanking the others were big, over seven feet tall and built like a brick house, each with a head like a triceratops and carrying almost aztecian war clubs, and with heavy crystalline armor. They had these short horns and blunt muzzles, and both of them had relatively short tails of about three feet with a clublike tip. Four of them had long necks and almost avian heads, with legs like a velociraptor's, claw included. Those were about my height, with little scales and a crest of feathers, each of them carrying some sort of crystal… something. I could've used magic to determine what it was, but now wasn't the time. But the majority of them looked like humanoid pterosaurs, though they stood a little shorter than me, and their wings were somewhat shrouded by their robes, I'd bet they had a wingspan four times my height.
"We were hoping to make trade!" I called as I came to a stop, Secret pausing just a little behind me as well.
Alright, thankfully between Universal Language and Words of Truth, I didn't need to worry about being understood or them thinking we were lying. Catch was that I couldn't lie. But I could deal with that. Didn't protect me from social flubs, but at least I could be social.
I felt a tingle of magic across my skin, and I eased my Mage Sight open in response. I caught the tail end of the effect pressing against me, the circuitry of a mental connection fading. I'd have known if it was affecting my mind, so a reading myster- charm.
"Who are you?" the lead one, one of the pterodactyl like ones, questioned, coming to a stop, flanked by its brethren.
"I am Kenobi, a mortal spellcaster, " I said, putting my left hand to my chest, my grip on Prometheus tighter than it honestly should have been even as I gestured to Secret behind me, "And this is Secret, an Abyssal seeking to escape the hold of the Deathlords."
One of the big burly reptiles growled at the word Deathlords, and a spike of obvious wariness shot through the others. Not surprising, but they also seemed uncomfortable, what with the fact that I was telling the Truth.
"You speak like a Chosen of the Sun," one of the other pterodactyl like ones stated warily. Each of the more raptor-like Dragon Kings had these crystal pistol-like things lined up with Secret and I.
"An emulation only, unfortunately. So long as I speak the truth, you'll know it. And any lies will be obvious by the absence of such. For example," pressing my left hand to my chest again I spoke, "I am a woman." More narrowed eyes from them before I continued, "I'm a man."
The Dragon Kings all glanced amongst each other, aside from the two burly ones, they kept themselves focused on Secret and I. Actually reminded me of Gangrel vampires in a coven, and surprisingly I found that comforting. That said, we were at a distinct disadvantage here… I noted that all of them had little patches of missing scales or feathers, having a roughly sickly appearance… they all died from disease? That wasn't enough. I needed more information.
A quick little imago, a brief little Knowing and Unveiling spell with a good scope and range. I took a few moments to tap into the metals and foci in Prometheus as well as link the spell to my own focus.
8 dice = 7 5 4 2 1 3 8 4 = 1 Success ; +1 Clue: 2 Elements
The spell barely settled into place, and I could barely feel it connect to the Dragon King ghosts, their simple power rebuffing any attempts. Hell, it did bounce off some of them. But those it did settle into told me a lot. I could see their age and the anchors they had to the living world, something every Ghost inherently had to have. They were all functionally the same age… and the anchors I could see were simple, their living brethren, their culture, their faith in the Unconquered Sun… Okay, so what did that tell me?
Turning back to us, the lead Dragon King asked, "What do you seek?"
"To return to Creation safely and escape the Deathlords." I gestured at Secret for the second half of that even as I pondered and pointedly ignored the desire to make a Monty Python reference.
Investigation roll, Intelligence + Investigation + Clues: 10 Dice = 9 8 1 5 (10 3) (10 10 8) 9 3 9 3 = 8 Successes
"And I think we can help one another." They all died from disease hundreds of years ago, functionally simultaneously… that meant they'd almost certainly all died because of the Great Contagion. But they'd done so on purpose, or at least had chosen to die and remain as ghosts instead of reincarnating, likely in an attempt to retain enough of their consciousness and memories to educate their feral brethren… but the utter lack of any living Dragon Kings here meant that they weren't able to for some reason or another.
"And how is that?" The burly Dragon King that had growled earlier demanding, gesturing with its spiked club. The motion made Secret step closer to my side, nearly in front of me, her hands half raised as fists. Even without a weapon, she'd moved to protect the defenseless mortal… I had a moment of rather intense gratefulness at that despite it being unnecessary.
I glanced at the speaking Dragon King, "Unless I miss my mark… you want to get to Creation to the corresponding reflection of this village and educate your still feral brethren and thus preserve your race and culture…" I trailed off, watching their reactions. There were more than a few narrowed eye ridges at that, as well as tightening grips on their guns, but no outright hostile reactions, "With some effort, I should be able to reach into Creation. In return for shelter and teaching, I'd be happy to open up a relatively permanent gateway for you."
Secret's head jerked towards me, eyes wide. Probably at my admission I could probably jerk us to Creation. But I made a little gesture with my left hand, wordlessly asking her to let me continue. I hadn't offered or tried earlier mostly because I wasn't sure if I could, and I didn't know what was on the other side. But here, I might just be able to. Especially given that these appeared to be sages, and would likely be able to help me if something weird happened.
"You are capable of such?" the lead pterodactyl questioned.
"I believe so, but I cannot be certain." I admitted. I had to. I could not lie while maintaining the effect.
"What of the Deathknight?" the leader asked, nodding his head at Secret so close to me, "How do we know she is not controlling you?"
"She has not used any social magics on me, and I believe she is incapable of doing such at this time." I said as calmly as I could manage, trying to think my way through explaining this and being truthful without giving too much away, "I have numerous reasons to believe her when she says that she seeks to escape the grip of the Deathlords, and very little to believe that she is lying to me."
They glanced amongst one another once again, before the lead pterodactyl, an interestingly bright pink one compared to the other greens and purples, stepped forward, "Do you swear not to harm us or our kin?"
"I swear that I have no harmful intent towards you or your people."
Eye ridges narrowed, "You refuse to swear not to harm us?"
I shook my head sadly, admitting, "I cannot in good conscience do so. If I must fight you to protect my companion I will do so and refuse to be bound in such a way to prevent that." Secret's eyes jerked towards me in surprise, but I kept my own gaze locked on the lead Dragon King.
One of the burly Dragon Kings bristled at that, "You dare-?!"
"Would you swear upon the Unconquered Sun to not attack someone unconditionally when they would not swear the same for yourself and your clutch?" I countered, meeting the other ghost's gaze without flinching, "I do not expect things to take that turn, but I take my oaths seriously. I will not swear something that will prevent me from protecting my companion."
The large Dragon King growled once more, hefting its spiked club upwards slightly; my hand tightening around Prometheus as my thumb touched its lid; Secret tensing up like a tightly wound spring, her eyes locked on the large ghost…
But the pink pterodactyl-like Dragon King extended a wing out between the two of us, breaking line of sight. The two of them glared at one another in a contest of wills for a long moment before the larger Dragon King backed down with an unhappy snort, lowering its spiked club. It was only then that I was able to relax my grip on Prometheus. The pink Dragon King retracted its wing and turned towards me, yellow eyes boring into me across the dozen yards separating our two groups, "If you are able to follow through with your promise, we will be forever indebted to you for enabling us to save our wayward people… but until that time, you and your companion will be under guard."
I looked at Secret out of the corner of my eye to make sure she was okay with this… and found her eyes flicking back and forth between the two Dragon King ghosts that had been speaking. Her hands were clenched at her sides and she was subtly shifting her weight back and forth on the balls of her feet, seemingly torn…
Compassion = 8 4 3 2= 1 Success
My left hand leaned out to brush the back of my knuckles against her own, giving her a little start. Crimson eyes glanced at me in surprise and I gave her a small smile, as reassuring as I could make it. Her eyes flicked down to my hand, which I turned slightly in an offering. Flicking her gaze back up to my own questioningly, I just raised my eyebrows slightly and kept smiling. Almost hesitantly, her hand came out to grasp mine, cool and rough with callouses. Her grip was strong, and a little, almost timid smile crossing her face as she gripped my hand tightly.
Turning my attention back to the Dragon Kings, I bowed slightly, Secret mimicking my movement, "That is acceptable. We are grateful for your hospitality."
The Dragon Kings approached cautiously, weapons still trained on us as they moved to encircle Secret and I. Her cool hand tightened in mine and I squeezed back reassuringly. The two largest of them took up on either side of us, two of the raptor-like ones behind us and two ahead, the other six taking up positions all around us. The leader, almost hilariously shorter than me by a full head, stepped up, "I am Pterock Rambena, lead researcher of the Lakshadi colony."
I bowed my head slightly, "I am called Kenobi, mortal spellcaster. I shall be in your care."
"Come then," the roughly humanoid mystical dinosaur turned around, heading back towards the mosque-like structure, "We shall see whether you are capable of what you say or not, mortal."
"Thank you." I said simply, following after the Dragon King.
"Kenobi…" Secret whispered, still holding tightly to my hand and standing close as we were shepherded by the Dragon Kings.
"Yes?" I whispered back.
"What's going on?"
I blinked. Then it hit me. My Universal Language spell had been cast on myself. She hadn't understand a word of what the Dragon Kings side of the conversation.
"… knew I was forgetting something."
Last edited:
Ball 2 - Supple
- Location
- Florida, United States
Body Control (Will last one month. Extensive control of bodily functions. Requires 1/8th the normal amount of food, water, and air. Heartbeat operates at 1/8th speed. Heals at 8x speed.)
Tracking Ward (Still operating. Particularly powerful anti-death-scrying ward. Potency 6, duration 1 month)
Motonic Conversion (Still operating. Allows absorption of death energies as a creature of death.)
Tracking Ward (Still operating. Particularly powerful anti-death-scrying ward. Potency 6, duration 1 month)
Motonic Conversion (Still operating. Allows absorption of death energies as a creature of death.)
A.N.) THIS IS IMPORTANT:
There is a link in the word "bad" in this chapter, it's pretty brutal, those with uneasy stomachs or at work should probably not click it.
Ball 2
Supple
*scrtchscrtch*
"Kenobi?"
*scrtchscrtch*
"Yes?"
*scrtchscrtch*
"This is really uncomfortable for me."
I glanced up, finding her sitting in the grass not far away, warily watching the Dragon Kings ghosts around us. "Can't blame you."
Secret shifted in place, glancing back at me from her watch of the spiked clubs the burly Dragon Kings were carrying.
*scrtchscrtch*
"Why didn't you tell me you could get to Creation?"
"I'm not positive I can," I admitted, "And without land on the other side to jump to, it'd be really dangerous. It was possible, but it wasn't something I wanted to try until we had some ground to work on. I didn't want to get your hopes up."
She glared at me at that, "That's why you didn't try, not why you didn't tell me."
That made me cringe, because really? I didn't have a good reason other than forgetting to, "Honestly? Because I'm a stupid asshole."
"Can say that again," she muttered.
"I'm a stupid asshole?" The corner of her mouth quirked up at that, which I considered a small victory, "But really, I'm used to hiding what I can do, too much honestly. But that's an excuse. I'm sorry, I should have mentioned the possibility."
"Just don't do it again," Secret grumbled, at least slightly mollified.
With a little awkward smile, I returned to scratching out the runes into the ground using Prometheus.
Universal Language = 7 Dice = 3 6 (10 6) 6 5 6 8 = 2 Successes
Most of the dozen Dragon Kings that had met us on the path were watching the two of us warily, Rambena had gone off to inform the rest of the little colony though. I on the other hand had been put straight to task, taken to the geomantic center of the place under guard. It also doubled as the rough center of the roughly circular… town? The town square? It was hard to give it a better name than 'colony' really. From here I could tell that the towers had been arranged in a roughly spiral pattern, and power definitely flowed in to this point before pushing back outwards through the buildings.
I'd taken long enough to dispel my Universal Language spell and rebuilt it to affect Secret as well. I'd released that with a dollop of will to reduce the strain on my Pattern. As it is, I was holding three spells together and would be casting another, the fewer spells I was maintaining the better. I'd just need to keep an eye on the spell to make sure it didn't start to fray and do something weird.
... town circle. That's what I was gonna call it.
"What… are you doing?"
"Inscribing a runic circle to contain and channel the effect." I glanced up at her curiously, looking away from the runes I was carving into the grass. The pale green stuff was everywhere, but along the paths it was more like astroturf than normal grass, I vaguely remembered Dragon Kings using special, magically bio-engineered grass, but only vaguely and didn't feel like casting the spell to recall specifically. Still, Secret had asked that in a weird tone, "Why do you ask like that…?"
"Well, I don't have a weapon, but if someone were to show me a way to fight without a weapon… it'd be handy, y'know?"
I chuckled, "I can make you a weapon when we've got this sorted out. It won't be Artifact caliber, but it'll be solid. And to answer your question, I can try and teach you my magic. I don't do Sorcery the same way most beings do, and I'm actually not sure you can learn how to do it my style."
"I know you don't have a reason to really trust me but I–" she froze mid-sentence, "… wait, what?"
"I'll teach you." I said as I worked, "Though I make no promises about my style of sorcery being compatible with you."
*scrtchscrtch*
"I… honestly expected to have to work more at that." Secret admitted quietly.
"Like I said to the Dragon Kings. I have a number of reasons to believe you, and only a small number not to." I paused long enough to look up at her teasingly, "A lot of it is in the fact that you're a terrible liar. What are you, Manipulation 1?"
Now I didn't perceive the world in actual numbers like that, but if she was able to make jokes about me being Occult 5 or such, then they had at least some basis here.
"H-Hey!"
That and her reaction was adorable.
I chuckled, "Don't worry. I can't really help you there, I'm more of a Charisma guy than a Manipulation one, but I can help with other things. Do you have any Martial Arts?"
"You know martial arts too?" her eyebrows went up, "Don't those cost a ton for mortals? Just how much XP do you have?"
"No supernatural martial arts," I disagreed, shaking my head. But you better fucking bet I'll be keeping an eye out for them. If I can learn how to use those, even only as much as a mortal can, they'd be an enormous boon. I was relatively non-squishy by mage standards, but I was still squishy. Especially by local standards. "Buuut… I can get you started on non-magical martial arts, which will give you a head start on the fun stuff."
Being able to edit your brain with magic made picking up more mundane skills a fair bit easier than normal.
The pale young woman slumped slightly with a little pout, "Awww… no Martial Arts charms…?"
"What the hell kind of mystical martial art did you expect to learn from me?" I asked with amused incredulity, grinning despite myself, "Sidereal Kung Fu? I'm a mortal, the best I could provide is Terresterial Martial Arts, which is below your level."
She raised a finger to counter me before pausing, her mouth open. Then her hand fell, "Good point… I keep forgetting you're just a mortal."
I grinned, "Then I'm doing something right."
"Hopefully you can do something else right." I glanced over at the pink pterodactyl-like Dragon King as he walked up to us, the other saurians parting to allow Rambena into the clearing that comprised the geomantic center of the colony.
"With any luck." I agreed easily.
"We have our doubts," He said… at least I think Rambena was a he. The pink might indicate otherwise but who the fuck knew what kind of secondary sexual characteristics a roughly humanoid saurian might have? Even if the Dragon King wasn't shrouded in flowing robes of pretty high quality, I doubt I'd recognize anything that'd help me. I guess I'll mentally default to male for now. "Even the greatest sorcerers amongst us have not been able to do this."
That made me pause, I hadn't realized there were sorcerers amongst them, but I should have honestly, "Really? Could you elaborate on why?"
"There are numerous wards on the island to prevent the formation of shadowlands there." Rambena said with a small dip of his head, watching my reaction.
I frowned, that could be problematic, "What about teleportation or gate magic? Or were there any wards to prevent demon summoning?" From my understanding of the metaphysics from the books, demon summoning was far more analogous to what I was about to do than the formation of a shadowland. I was basically punching a hole through the fabric of reality rather than bringing the two segments of reality close enough to overlap.
"There were wards against teleportation from outside of the island, but nothing between two points on it…" Rambena's head bobbed forward twice, eyes narrowing before he added, "I… am actually unsure as to whether they would treat this as within the island or without…"
I hummed unhappily at that. It wasn't enough to change what I was doing, but it was enough to make me worry. Returning to scratching the runes into the grass, I sighed, "Alright, just going to have to deal with that when I get there."
Rambena glanced at Secret briefly before walking closer, the young woman keeping a close eye on the smaller Dragon King, "What are you attempting to do?"
"Essentially a reverse summoning circle across the ghostly plane, just… persistent." I made a point of meeting the Dragon King's gaze, "This is mostly a test run though, especially after what you've just told me. This could fail and I would not be surprised, but it'll tell me more about why it failed. And if it succeeds, I'm going to want to do it again, but with a more elaborate and powerful set up."
An agreeing bob of Rambena's head was the response to that, "I must admit, more than a few of us are concerned, this sort of magic is normally beyond mortals."
Temperance = 7 6 5 4 4 = 1 Success
I smiled just a bit at that, and damn nearly said 'I'm not most mortals', but I just barely suppressed the urge, instead saying, "We'll see then, won't we?"
-oOo-
"Alright…" I murmured, looking over the runic circle I'd inscribed into the turf, my Mage Sight already opened up, "Let's see how these wards react..."
Things were still tense, what with the guard of Dragon Kings watching us like hawks, and I couldn't blame Secret at all for not being comfortable under their gaze. I was only really okay because I was used to working under the wary and threatening gaze of things… y'know, like Vampires or Werewolves. Werewolves were worse by the by, a wolf as tall at the shoulder as you are sniffing at you while you worked is very disconcerting. By comparison, large humanoid dinosaurs with various weapons encircling you but not outright threatening you aren't that bad.
I held my hands out before me over the runic circle I'd spent the past hour or so scratching out and double checking.
Still bad though. I was nervous, just not as uncomfortable as my pale companion.
Taking a slow, calming breath, I flexed my fingers and opened myself to the flow of power. "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Death>, #Practice(Fraying) , #Practice(Weaving) ;" my nimbus began to flare, the gears and pistons of circuitry forming as I began to build up pressure against the barrier between the twilight and reality. The wireframe structure of a circuit piston formed over the circle, slowly rising into the air above it as I built up power, the circuits of power slowly growing out of the bottom of it to form a drill-like apparatus, "Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Prometheus) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Ghost Gate."
Ghost Gate (11 Dice) = 4 (9 1) (9 7) 1 7 7 5 2 (9 5) (9 7) 1 = 4 Successes
I released the spell, and the piston shot downward, spinning as it tore its way into the fabric of reality, reweaving it behind it to create a brief hole. It was… different from doing so in the World of Darkness, not that such a thing was surprising, but it was similar enough to function. Like a pebble dropped in water, a shimmering pool of vibrant colors appeared in the runic circle, rippling as it coalesced and stabilized, a flash of living power pouring through the hole, of life and living energy and vitality that the Underworld lacked, Secret flinching away from it even as–
Golden lightning arced from the shimmering pool that formed in the ground-! I threw up my arms in a desperate bloc–
PAIN!
With a thunderous crack I was knocked backwards by the impact of the bolt! "Gyah-!"
"Kenobi!"
I hit the grass hard, slamming on my back with my hands held above me as the pool nearly exploded. It was like a boulder had been dropped into a far too small pond, multicolored motes of light splashing upwards in a small geyser before fading away like snow melting in the air before it touched the ground.
Ow.
And here I was left with everything from my elbows down charred and blackened and melted. I hissed in pain, closing my eyes and pointedly trying not to pay attention to the fact that some of the threads from my shirt had been scorched into my half melted skin, charred and cracked and already starting to ooze. Ugh, talk about backlash. Holy shit.
"Kenobi! Kenobi are you okay?"
Temperance = 10 10 8 8 7 = 7 Successes
I took a slow breath, saying far more calmly than I actually felt, my eyes still scrunched tight, "Secret. My hands are scorched to all hell right now. I'll be okay later, but right now I'm in a lot of pain. Shouting won't help, so take a few breaths and calm down."
"I… but…" she stopped, cutting herself off, though I couldn't be sure what she was doing with my eyes closed.
"I'll be okay." I insisted, experimentally giving my fingers a twitch and cringing at the resulting pain. Damn, this was as bad as Prime damage… that was a nasty ward. It felt like my skin had been charred black, like a scorched burger… ugh… "It just sucks right now."
"Hrnf, it seems you can't get through." The rumble of the big burly Dragon King that had been uppity about honor before broke through my concentration.
There was a shuffle, sounding as if Secret had stood quickly, "Hey! Back off! He got hurt trying to help you!"
"Secret," I cut her off, stopping any further rants as I opened my eyes. Eeeyup. That looks bad. Ugh, so this is what Aggravated Damage is like… memo to self, if I can ever send something back to World of Darkness, send back a fruit basket for the Pack for taking the time to help me understand how silver interacted with werewolves. This stuff suuuuuuucks.
"But…"
"It's okay. Like I said, I'll be okay." I looked over at her, the younger woman standing beside me protectively. The Dragon King ghosts had moved about at the activation of the spell, and the one burly one whose name I still hadn't got was looking down his blunt, purple muzzle at me.
"It seems that the wards do prevent your spell from working." I glanced at Rambena who is way closer than I thought, the pink Dragon King kneeling and looking at my blasted forearms contemplatively. But then those yellow eyes focused on mine, "However, that test was far better than anything we have been able to accomplish in the past centuries. How did you do that?"
Cringing, I muttered, "Could you wait just a second? This really fucking hurts."
Ugh, with my magic as it was, this was going to be a fucking strain, but I could not function with my hands like this. Even a brief glance with my Mage Sight confirmed that this wasn't 'normal' horrifying physical damage, but was horrifying spiritual damage as well. Right, healing spell then. Gonna have to just pour power into this to deal with the spiritual damage, otherwise magic just wouldn't affect it. That was one of the hallmarks of what both World of Darkness and Exalted called 'Aggravated Damage' was the fact that it resisted supernatural healing.
"Runtime Start:: #Arcanum(Life), #Practice(Patterning) ; Yantra(Mantra) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Mending."
Mending – Wound Penalty: (8 Dice)= 4 7 (10 6) (10 1) 6 4 3 = 2 Successes; Wisdom (3 8 5 5 2 5 (10 5) 1) vs Paradox (9 6 4 5)
I cringed slightly as the overreaching spell invoked some of the Abyss, I could usually just ignore it, but god damn that stung what with my damaged limbs… but the power I poured into the spell did its job. Scouring the spiritual damage from my hands as it rebuilt my pattern. My flesh rippled as brief little flashes of circuitry and sewing machinery flashed within and around my limbs, sealing up the cracks and returning some appropriate human color to my skin with the sensation of pins and needles washing down to my fingertips.
But within moments, the tingles were gone, and that uncomfortable soul-chill of the Underworld's air washed over my forearms once again, and that was miles better than the fucking agony of my arms being like that.
I sighed in relief, "Much better…"
Pushing myself up to my feet, I dusted myself off, finding Rambena still watching me expectantly. Both Rambena and Secret were standing nearby, nearly withins arms reach of me, the other Dragon Kings in the circle around us only just now starting to relax after that excitement.
"Right, so, to answer your question: Shadowlands are where Creation and the Underworld get so metaphysically similar that they become the same thing, that area becomes part of both and they overlap." A nod, the pink Dragon King had already known that, "What I just did was more like demon summoning in creating a hole between the two realities rather than making them the same spot." Holding up my thankfully regenerated hands, but not so repaired clothing I added as I jazz-hands'ed, "Not that the wards seemed to like that either mind you, but the principle is sound. I'm working around the primary anti-shadowland wards rather than against them."
Perfect Recall (11 Dice) = 7 3 9 2 5 6 1 4 4 2 9 = 2 Successes
Replaying the event in my head, I paid attention to the duration, target, origin, aspect, and generally everything about the bolt of power that had hit me. And with my mage sight opened, that was quite a bit.
I picked up Prometheus again, having dropped it at some point in the blazing agony of that golden bolt. Bouncing the lighter multitool in my hand a few times as I considered the issue, turning back towards the circle.
Gnosis + Prime Arcanum vs Rank 3 Mystery
1 9 2 (10 1) 7
2 8 (10 3) 1 8 ; -1 Mystery
7 4 6 5 7
8 4 (10 3) 2 5 ; -1 Mystery
8 (10 10 1) (10 5) 3 (10 8) ; -1 Mystery
1 9 2 (10 1) 7
2 8 (10 3) 1 8 ; -1 Mystery
7 4 6 5 7
8 4 (10 3) 2 5 ; -1 Mystery
8 (10 10 1) (10 5) 3 (10 8) ; -1 Mystery
"Kenobi…?" Secret interrupted my musings, a hand half raised towards me in concern as the other touched the small silver circle dangling around her neck, "Are you really okay?"
I just smiled at her warmly, "I'm fine. But it's probably going to take me a while to draw up a spell that'll safely open something more enduring." The last part was said at the humanoid pterodactyl just out of arms reach, trying to convey that it'd take some time and not to expect a miracle.
"You could make something more lasting right now?" Rambena asked curiously, head tilting to the side as he folded his clawed hands together before himself.
"Yes, but I'd be blasted again if I tried, and I'm pretty sure I can't maintain a casting while getting blasted like that." I mean, I might be able to if I prepared myself for it, but I was already pushing my limits with my spells and adding a spell so I could spell while I spell'd wouldn't be ideal. Not that sort of internal spell at least…
The dinosaur-like sage nodded, "We have waited centuries, we can wait a while longer. Do you need rest?"
Shaking my head even before he finished the question, I denied, "No. Thank you though. But I'm on a time crunch that none of you are. I'm mortal and need to eat and drink and all those glorious things. Unless you have something here palatable for me to eat and draw sustenance from, or at least some other way for me to regain life based energies, I'm on borrowed time. The sooner I get to Creation, the better."
I exaggerated slightly for effect, I still had a fair bit of time, but I was on a time crunch they weren't.
Yellow eyes looked at me with an expression that could only be called 'calculating'. I waited a few moments in case he wanted to speak, but when nothing came, I gave a little bow and turned back to the mandola I'd inscribed on the ground, "I'll be back to work then."
Rambena said nothing as I took a knee beside the runic inscription and started to carve. I had no idea what to do about that ward yet, but I did know that I was going to need a spell enhancing matrix. It was a rote spell I'd gotten from the Seers of the Throne and modified to suit my aesthetics and style, ending up like a runic gear around the inner spell it was enhancing, which I usually did with runes as well.
I liked runes, could you tell?
"Secret was it?" My head almost jerked up at Rambena's voice, that gender neutral sort of rasp that had a bit of that falsetto sort of sound like a parrot's, just with good diction and all. He was addressing Secret?
"Yeeesss…?" I couldn't blame her for sounding wary. It'd definitely caught me by surprise.
"What do you know of sorcery?"
"Um…" I could hear Secret shuffle in place, "Not much…?"
"Then I shall start your education–"
"Rambena-?!" the burly Dragon King roared. Literally roared, it sounded almost like a damn T-Rex was shouting the name, "What are you doing?!"
Prometheus' lid was flipped open, my thumb on the activation lever of the lighter as I knelt there, frozen in place. But Rambena was on the ball it seemed, "Tlacotl! Stand down."
"You're offering to teach sorcery to an agent of the Deathlords!" There was a terrible thud as the burly reptile's spiked club slammed into the ground, taking a half step towards us, the foot coming down with a resounding thud.
"I am offering to teach the ally of the amiliki that did in an hour what we could not do over six centuries!" our pink… I hesitated to call him an ally, but Rambena was definitely on our side, screeched. But not like a human, screeched the way that a bird or animal would, it was far more intimidating, "Honor demands that we repay him!"
"Honor only demands such after he's succeeded!" Tlacotl bared his teeth, the purple Dragon King's arms out wide as he made himself larger and significantly more intimidating, it was a motion I actually recognized from numerous Werewolves. It was an intimidation gesture, a reflexive one of 'I'm big and scary', and when you're over seven feet tall and built from chorded, scaly steel, it was pretty effective.
But the pink, pterodactyl-like Rambena wasn't intimidated, robes shifting slightly as the Dragon King that was barely the size of Secret locked gazes with his larger brethren, "And you still doubt it Tlacotl? Truly?"
"You are acting before things are ready! You are pre-empting honor!" Carefully, I built the imago in my head. I didn't want to fight here, but if this devolved into one I needed to be ready…
"We may never be able to repay him, not within a mortals lifetime, not unless we start immediately." The larger Dragon King growled into Rambena's beak-like face, but the pink Dragon King neither moved forward, nor retreated, despite the larger Dragon King looming over him and being easily three times Rambena's size. Softly, barely louder than Tlacotl's growl, but easily the loudest thing in the clearing, Rambena asked, "Or would you be willing to allow such a debt to go unpaid?"
Tlacotl shook in place, whisps of ghostly essence trailing out of the corners of his mouth like smoke from a dragon's maw… and I would not have been surprised if that was truly the case here… an emulation of an old ability… For several long moments, I was worried that things would devolve into a battle, but eventually, Tlacotl snorted and looked away. The purple Dragon King straightening and turning away, the ground actually shaking slightly as he stomped away, "Don't call me until this blows up in your face."
While the rough circle of ghosts parted to allow Tlacotl to walk out, a few of them followed after the burly Dragon King. The others looking distinctly uncomfortable. Secret shot me a questioning glance, but I could only shrug, returning to my efforts. I could definitely understand Tlacotl's perspective, but there wasn't anything I could do to improve his disposition other than following through with my promise. So long as it didn't turn into a fight before then, I could deal with it.
"I must apologize for Tlacotl's behavior," Rambena said after turning back to us and bowing slightly, "She is merely worried about her clutch and our collective honor."
Huh. I'd been agonizing a bit over getting gender right but it seems I really couldn't tell the difference…
"It's okay, I think. I sort of… wait… that's a girl?!"
Rambena just stared. But one of the other Dragon Kings in the circle grumbled, "You humans… always so racist."
"To be fair," I noted with a smile and without turning, "We don't know what are just expressions of your individuality and what're signs of sexual dimorphism amongst Dragon Kings. Most people in this Age don't even know what a Dragon King is, let alone details about your people such as those."
The pink, pterodactyl-like Rambena turned to look at me questioningly, "… are you saying that you didn't realize that I'm female?"
A small shrug from me, "I didn't want to assume one way or the other for the above reasons, no."
There was a soft thwap, and a quick glance confirmed that the pterodactyl-like Dragon King had facepalmed, "And this is the person that's saving our species."
I smiled, "To be fair, I went out of my way to avoid making a faux pas out of it."
A sigh before she shook her head, turning back to Secret, "Regardless, I shall begin your induction into the occult arts. Sit with me, and learn."
"O-Okay…"
Before they could sit, I said over my shoulder,"You might want to make some space, because I'm going to need a good bit of it to inscribe this."
Rambena nodded at that before returning to the Abyssal, "While he works, you shall tell me of your past."
"Right… um…" the two of them moved to the edge of the rough circle of the 'town circle', "Backstory time I guess…"
The two of them settled down on the grass, Rambena's flowing white robes splaying around her elegantly, and Secret folding her legs up beside her to deal with her skirt. It took her a moment to get started, but the young woman picked up speed as she talked, "I… I used to be an Abyssal of the Silver Prince. But… I wasn't exactly very good. After I was Exalted I was put through a lot of training to prepare me for my new existence. Unfortunately, I had trouble… adapting."
"I didn't do too well at fighting… or stealth… or much else, really. Of course, this was unacceptable. Even special aids didn't help me much. So I was sent to visit the other Deathlords, in hopes they could teach me better. And I traveled all the Underworld… to the court of the Mask of Winters… the Lover Clad in Raiment of Tears… even to the First and Forsaken Lion…" she trailed off, a hand going to her necklace briefly as her other arm wrapped around her stomach, taking a light grasp of her elbow, "I did get a bit stronger. But… the Deathlords, particularly the Lion… I got to see how… how terrible they were. And on the way back to Skullstone… I finally decided I couldn't go along with it anymore. I was going to run away from the Silver Prince, from the Deathlords, from the Underworld… from all of it… I… I ran into Kenobi not long after that."
While there were a number of suspicious gazes sent Secret's way from the other ghosts encircling us, others seemed more sympathetic. But all of it was muted, ghosts had strange emotions at best. Rambena though seemed unmoved one way or the other, "You have had no occult training?"
"Not really…" Secret said with a little shake of her head, "I'm a Day Caste… they expected me to be an assassin… they didn't teach me anything but how to fight and sneak…"
I took a moment to interject, "I'm thinking some non-deathy options would be good for her. Help her get away from the yawning chasm of the Maw of Oblivion and start to forge an identity separate from it." There was silence at that, and I actually looked up at them, finding both were staring at me, "… what?"
"Nothing." Rambena shook her head, turning back to Secret, "Now, what do you know of Essence?"
"It's the energy we use to power charms and spells."
Scratching the rune into–
Death Shielding (9 dice: 8 (10 2) 7 (10 7) 5 2 1 6 3 = 3 Successes) vs ??? (10 Dice: 10 9 7 1 1 8 1 10 2 1 = 7 Successes + 5 Successes
My hand shot to my head as a spell thundered into the shielding magic I'd put around Secret, barreling right over and through the protective magic I'd put in place like a frigid ice-pick to the temple! "NNNG!"
"Kenobi?!"
Ugh, god, fuck… my head was ringing from that one! Holy shit.
I didn't know when Secret had crossed the distance between us, but she apparently had. Her hands were hovering over me, concerned but hesitant to actually touch me, "Kenobi! You're bleeding, what happened?"
"What-?" That question brought my gaze up to her in confusion, and it took my eyes a second to focus, damn that had done a number on me. Bringing a hand up to my face, I found wetness… the trickle of blood seeping from my nose left stains of red on my fingertips as I examined them… "… oh. … huh."
"Are you okay?" she asked again.
Giving my head a little shake to scatter the cobwebs that'd draped over it, I grumbled out a, "Yeah… I'm alright… just caught by surprise."
"What happened?" Rambena's voice broke through my thoughts even as I pulled my pocket square out and wiped my face. Her tone had jumped straight back to cautiousness at that. Not that I could blame her.
"I'm not as good at warding spells as I'd thought." I admitted before thinking it through. But decided to roll with it, "Either that, or I severely underestimated the forces arrayed against us."
"… what?" Secret's voice was small and afraid, not that I could blame her.
"Someone tried to find you and punched right through my ward." I said with a little nod at her, "So it's a good thing that I'm working on a way to Creation now."
One of the pterodactyl-like Dragon Kings encircling us asked, "Someone's trying to find her?"
"Now they are it seems," I agreed with a little nod. But despite the ease of my admission, Secret still seemed to shrink in on herself.
A third Dragon King growled, "I bet it's the Prince, he wouldn't let a pawn escape his hold."
I want you to imagine a cat growling. Now, I want you to imagine something like a full grown Siberian tiger growling. Now I want you to think of an alligator's 'roar'. The sound that came from the clutch of Dragon Kings around us could be compared to a gator's bellow the same way a Siberian tiger's growl could be likened unto a kitten's.
Valor = 9 6 3 = 1 Success
Secret shuffled a bit closer to me at that, not that I could even start to blame her. I would be the fucking first to admit I was a good bit intimidated by just under a dozen of those surrounding me.
"Maybe we should let them have her… when we're this close to achieving our goals…"
Compassion = 10 9 6 3 = 3 Successes
The entire group of Dragon Kings bristled at that, heads jerking to the long-necked raptor-like Dragon King that had spoken, but I beat Rambena to the punch.
"Let me cut that off right there," I half snarled at the offending ghost, "You kick her out or hang her out to dry, I go too. We're a package deal."
Secret stared at me, but I did my best to tune it out, meeting each of the Dragon King's gazes in turn and daring them to try and force my hand. Even so, the younger woman softly muttered, "Kenobi…"
Rambena though made the point moot, whirling on the larger Dragon King, "And even if that was not the case, Tochtli, you would dare insinuate that we'd go against a bargain we made?"
The long-necked raptor stiffened, "No-! I just-! She's a Deathknight!"
"We entered a deal knowing such. And I shall not besmirch hour souls with such a mark against them." This time, Rambena drew herself up to her full height, her wings flaring out slightly as she did as she looked down her beak-like face at Tochtli, "They have asked for shelter and teaching in return for a gateway to the living world and the ability to assist our kin. So far they have shown the ability and inclination to follow through, so we shall do everything in our power to do the same."
"I–" the green Dragon King started before their long neck drooped, breaking eye contact, "Yes sifu."
Secret stared at Rambena, but I allowed myself to relax, "Thank you. I shall get back to work."
"That would be best," the saurian said with a nod before turning to back to the others encircling us, "Someone will need to inform Tlacotl and gather a council to prepare our defenses just in case."
"Tlacotl's not gonna be happy about this…" one of the pterodactyl-like Dragon Kings muttered.
The other Dragon Kings all shared a glance before chorusing as one even as the speaker seemed to come to a realization, "Not it!"
"Not-!" the pterodactyl-king started a half second after the others, before realization hit him (or her) and their beak scrunched up, "Sol damn it!"
Smiling at their antics, I turned back to the runic circle, taking a knee as Rambena led Secret back over to the edge of the clearing. It seems my abilities wouldn't stack up against Deathlord or Abyssal tier tracing, not that such a thing should have been a surprise. But that meant that something particularly powerful and death-aspected was looking for Secret. And I'd bet my hat that it was either the Silver Prince or one of his Abyssals… and if this was who I suspected it was, it'd turn out well for Secret at least.
I just needed to avoid getting slaughtered by a terrifying, battle-focused demigod of death.
Y'know, easy stuff.
Last edited:
Ball 2 - Hole
- Location
- Florida, United States
Body Control (Ongoing. Still ~1.5 weeks left. Extensive control of bodily functions. Requires 1/8th the normal amount of food, water, and air. Heartbeat operates at 1/8th speed. Heals at 8x speed.)
Tracking Ward (Particularly powerful, but apparently useless anti-death-scrying ward.)
Motonic Conversion (Still operating. Allows absorption of death energies as a creature of death.)
Tracking Ward (Particularly powerful, but apparently useless anti-death-scrying ward.)
Motonic Conversion (Still operating. Allows absorption of death energies as a creature of death.)
Ball 2
Hole
"There are five trials one must overcome to learn sorcery." Rambena rasped, "To go on a Journey, to learn Humility, to find Tutelage, to overcome Fear, and to make a Sacrifice."
I glanced over the design carved into the grass as the pale sun slowly worked its way to the horizon, only listening in on Secret's tutelage with half an ear as I worked.
The central hole-punching spell, a spell enhancement circle around it, a metaphorical belt to connect it intrinsically to the cogwheel system on my end, which was going to be linked up to a couple other gear-systems built around circles. Those were drawn up to enhance and channel the power of other spellcasters and was meant to link up with the motonic converter spell I had running, with that stuff going on I could just dump mana into the Prime shielding spell I had built around my end.
"From what you have told me, you have just now begun your Journey, and still need to overcome Fear and make an appropriate Sacrifice to learn Sorcery," Rambena glanced in my direction, "However, I believe you have found sufficient Tutelage, and have already learned Humility."
The stuff on my end was more like a fume hood over a reaction, the contained reaction being the gateway I'd be making. I was barely an Apprentice of the Prime Arcanum, and no matter how useful the practices of Fraying or Unraveling might have been at dealing with this ward, I didn't know how to use them. I'd have to make do with Ruling, Shielding, and Veiling, guiding the response around myself and into another target rather than just tanking it. Because there was no way I had sufficient power to just counter a spell woven by Solars... or hell, any sort of Exalted or Dragon King in the First Age.
If that response to my ward had been any indication, I couldn't really come into direct conflict with maybe anyone here, not in their specialty at least.
"So…" I could hear Secret shift about uncomfortably, "What do I do?"
Alright, this is about as good as I was gonna come up with in a reasonable amount of time and with the resources they'd be likely to grant me… the issue was now how to set up all of the spells proper and not just the runic system. I could just start casting them as is, but my pattern was already loaded up with three spells, my body control, the wards on Secret, and the motonic converter. Any further spells would be a not-insignificant strain on my efforts…
"You must Journey beyond what is comfortable for you and find a new measure of comfort. Something I believe you are on your way to doing. You must overcome Fear. And you must make a Sacrifice. Should you overcome Fear and made an appropriate Sacrifice, I believe you would be able to learn Sorcery upon your return to Creation."
Ugh, that meant my options were: Dump tons of mana into this to avoid tearing myself to bits (Not really an option) ; Take a long time to go through the spells, hours on hours (Not looking forward to that at all) ; releasing one of my spells and going through each of these and setting them up with that free space in my Pattern (Not ideal seeing as all three of my currently held spells were pretty important) ; Risk tearing myself to bits with the power of the Abyss as I worked my way through the spells.
"How… how would I go about that?"
Right, so it boiled down to how confident I was in this working. If I was right and opened my pattern up by dropping my Life Control spell, I could work my way through this pretty quickly. I'd still have a couple days where I'd be okay without water, and if this failed I did still have some living mana leftover with which to recharge myself…
"The trials are very personal by their very nature, and I do not know you well enough to make appropriate suggestions."
Yeah, I was impatient enough to do this. The oppressive, supernatural chill of the Underworld was uncomfortable, and had only gotten progressively worse the longer I stayed. It was that cloying, disturbing sensation, like stepping through a spiderweb that chilled your skin, but worked its way slowly down to your very bones… blech.
"Oh…" Secret muttered dejectedly. But I couldn't really let that dejection stand, so I spoke up.
"I should be able to figure something out as we travel, Secret." Thankfully, I could probably spin something about being smart or magic and just hijack Misho's ideas. The trick was Humility honestly, I wasn't a good stand in for the King in that regard. But I could at least make her feel better for now.
"Really?" she asked, brightening a fair bit, "That's great!"
"It's no problem." I said with a warm smile before turning to her tutor, "Rambena, I'm going to need another two spellcasters to help make this work. I don't really have the raw power to fuel this safely."
"We can certainly provide," she nodded, standing and smoothing out her robes, "Many of us have mastered the Terrestrial Circle of Sorcery."
I gave a little bow, "I'd appreciate it if you could gather those you feel work best for it while I finish charging this up."
"Of course," she gave a little bob of her head before turning, leaving the town circle. As she did, the other Dragon Kings watched me with varying degrees of curiosity.
Kneeling beside the first of the Spell Enhancment Matricies, I touched a hand to the runic gear and murmured under my breath, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum(Fate), #Practice(Ruling) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mudra, Mandola) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Spell Enhancement Matrix."
The magic began to settle into place as I focused on the probabilities, it was a Fate spell meant to enhance and codify the nature of probability in my favor, basically, it was like deliberately pouring water in a certain way to create a channel that encouraged the water to fall long it… or like adding more circuits or bandwidth to a single branch of a circuit-board to make it more likely a signal would take that route. The route being 'cast this spell properly'.
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 7 6 3 4 6 1 9 (10 1) 2 8 = 3 Successes
And it was a spell I was damn good at.
The runes glowed a soft green, small sparks of pseudo-lightning jumping from the diagrams.
Secret spoke up as I began to move to the next circle, "What's all this do?"
"Most of this is just a fancy way of deflecting the response of the wards. I can't just block it, I'm not strong enough, so I've got to be a bit more clever about it." I took a knee next to one of the supporting gears, "Really, the gate-opening is the easy part, and just a sec."
Repeating the mantra with my hand on the mandola, sparks flew once more as the runes lit up. I systematically moved my way through the entire design, charging up the appropriate points, pausing to repeat the mantra as I continued our conversation, setting up the spells in the runic gears, two subtly different ones each for the main punchy spell and for the defending spell, and one each for the assistants.
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = (10 9) 4 4 8 1 5 (10 2) 5 7 7 = 4 Successes
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 3 1 9 2 6 8 9 2 2 1 = 3 Successes
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 8 2 4 (10 4) 2 7 4 1 7 8 = 3 Successes
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 1 7 2 3 8 3 7 2 1 7 = 1 Success
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 9 9 2 6 5 6 3 5 3 5 = 2 Successes
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 3 1 9 2 6 8 9 2 2 1 = 3 Successes
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 8 2 4 (10 4) 2 7 4 1 7 8 = 3 Successes
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 1 7 2 3 8 3 7 2 1 7 = 1 Success
Spell Enhancement Matrix (10 Dice) = 9 9 2 6 5 6 3 5 3 5 = 2 Successes
"What if you get blasted again?" she asked, resting her elbows on her knees and sitting in the grass not too far away from the design. She'd thankfully gotten more comfortable over the course of her teaching, no longer fidgeting, and her eyes no longer furtively darting about.
"This should withstand that just fine. The spell system is robust enough that even if my defenses fail, the spell itself should finish. But I'm gonna have a bad day if they do, and I'll keep my hands ready in case I need to block something nasty aimed at my face, but I should be able to survive anything other than face-blasting."
A little crack of my knuckles as I took a seat in the primary gear on my end, a focus of thought and a rather brutish channeling of some of my living mana activated my Prime Mage Armor, a field of Supernal Truth using my power as an assertion. It wasn't visible in any way nor was it particularly powerful, but it'd buffer against purely magical effects.
"Just be careful okay? It wouldn't do for the adventure to end this early." She tried to say it with confidence and snark, but she failed, too much concern worked its way into her tone, making me smile.
Crossing my legs, I settled in to get comfortable. I was going to be here a while, "That's what all of this is. Being careful."
"If you're sure…" she still looked uncertain, not that I could blame her. But this should work. A small sound drew my attention, and I twisted in place to look over my shoulder into the distance that Rambena had gone in.
The pink saurian was returning, and with far more than two Dragon King's in tow. Tlacotl and others followed after… it actually looked like two dozen more Dragon Kings, as well some of a variant I hadn't seen yet. It seems they'd come in force… more than a few had weapons… but Rambena didn't seem uneasy and the weapons were holstered. There, but not out and being brandished. Blech, wish I knew Dragon King social ticks better.
Secret was immediately and reasonably nervous as a parade of old and dangerous ghosts basically poured into the town circle. Red eyes glanced at me, "Kenobi…?"
"It's alright," I said, waving it off without standing, turning back to the diagram, "Odds are good that they're just here in case I'm lying and trying to open a gate for the Deathlords or some shit."
"That is correct, amiliki," Rambena rasped out, approaching with two Dragon Kings alongside her. One was one of the more raptor-like subspecies, while the other was the same species as Rambena, the pterodactyl like, "While you have not given us reason to distrust your word, we must take precautions."
"Of course." I bobbed my head agreeably, remaining where I was, "I completely understand."
Tlacotl and the other Dragon Kings spread out throughout the town circle. Some entering the nearby pyramids and finding comfortable places to sit while others took up places near the clearing itself, and more than a few of the pterodactyl like members of the species took to the air and settled on the roofs of the nearby habitation towers.
Intelligence + War (7 Dice) = 8 2 1 5 6 5 4 = 1 Success
Ah, they were setting up, casually mind you, but they were prepping for a sudden influx of enemies. The big burly ones with nasty clubs and such were closer to Secret and I, the raptor-like ones and the new, more hulkish ones tended to have these leaf swords or crystal crossbow weapons and were at a more mid range or were setting up in covered positions. And the flying ones were getting a height advantage. Made sense.
I looked at the two Dragon Kings that Rambena had brought over, both of them were in robes, even though a fair number of the other Dragon Kings had switched out for other materials and armors. While the larger of the two was this deep crimson, raptor-like breed, with a brilliant golden crest of feathers down their long neck, the other was much like Rambena. A more pterodactyl like Dragon King, bipedal and slender, with an almost crescent head and with long, almost spindly arms that doubled as membranous wings, a pale tan color rather than the more vibrant colors most of the other Dragon Kings scales seemed to favor. I grinned, "Evening, such that it is."
The long-necked raptor bowed its head briefly, not breaking our locked gazes, "Amiliki." His (or her?) companion bobbed their head as well in acknowledgement.
Awkward, but whatever. I clapped my hands, smiling as warmly as I could manage, "Right! So who am I working with today?"
"I am Huitzilin," the dark red raptor said, bobbing their head once more before gesturing at their companion, "And my partner is Chalchiuitl."
No less awkward! Wish there was some sort of social structure to fall back on here but fuck me if I knew it! But I powered through. "So, you two have a boring but sorta grueling and crucial job. These two gears?" I indicated the other two smaller ones that were linked to my own, "If you'll stand in those and shape sorcery at me, channeling energy into the system, I'll be handling the actual spellcraft, but the power you'll be molding will go into the defensive spells."
"The runes will channel it?" Huitzilin asked.
"Yes," I nodded, understanding the hesitation, "Though take it easy at first, this is built around subtlety first, raw power second. By your nature as Dragon Kings or Ghosts you might have more raw power than I accounted for, so let's take it easier at the start."
"What if it's too much?"
"Things fizzle, nothing blows up or reacts too badly. I should be able to tell you before that happens though." I looked between the two of them, "The issue here is that you two will need to maintain it for about an hour."
Surprisingly, they both nodded solemnly at that, unfazed. Good.
With a little breath for courage, I clapped my hands again and gestured back at the two circles, "Right, if you'll take your positions, we'll waste no more time then."
There were some whispers from the peanut gallery… though there probably should be a snappy name for them. The almond gallery? I dunno. The Dragon Kings whispered amongst themselves though even as the other two took up their positions. Rambena stayed near Secret, claws hands folded in front of her and the attached wings actually outside of her robes now.
My Mage Sight stayed wide open as I built my imago, watching as Huitzilin and Chalchiuitl moved their clawed hands about, pulling and tugging and Willing the mana in the air around them into form and shape in a way that I myself couldn't, not yet at least. But you'd better bet I'd be reviewing this all later.
Intelligence + Occult (8 Dice) = 10 10 10 7 5 4 1 1 = 7 Successes
Two pulses of power flowed towards me down the runic lines I'd carved out of the dirt, setting almost ghostly sparkles of light dancing along them… it was strange, the power was that of the ambient energy, but it wasn't [Death] energy the way that Secret was… I'd puzzle over that later though. Right now I had magic to work.
Opening myself to the power, I could feel it begin to cycle up my motonic converter… the system wasn't perfect, their shaped power wasn't the same sort of death essence I'd anticipated… but it was similar enough. It was like running a two cycle engine with straight gas… no, a better metaphor was running a normal engine with a gas-oil mix. It'd work, but one shouldn't do it for too long.
More and more power poured towards me, the metaphor of drowning wasn't appropriate, but it wasn't too far off. It was like standing in a river and trying to hold a water wheel in place to take advantage of it. Doable, but not easy either.
Holding both Prometheus and Epimetheus in my hands, I constructed the imago in my head, describing it in High Speech as it took form, "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum(Prime), #Practice(Ruling) ; #Practice(Shielding) ; Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Epimetheus) ; Variables(Duration, Potency, Focus, Scale, Range) ;" Slowly, taking my time, I described each bit of magic, carefully laying out what I was doing and how with the pseudo-gibberish that High Speech ended up sounding like to non-magi.
Even though I heard it as coding language, another mage might hear the same words as a sonnet, or as a song, or as some sort of guild cant or faux latin that made sense or any number of other things. The noises coming from my mouth didn't matter so much as the [Truth] behind them.
And it was a [Truth] I was working upon the world with my Will, and damn if I didn't want to not get blasted again.
Time passed as I fell into the trance of spellcasting, murmuring as I developed the magic piece by piece with words and thought. I fully expected to take nearly a full hour casting this one spell.
I could feel the first beginnings of a headache gnawing at the edges of my temples, releasing so many spells like this was a strain. A half dozen Spell Enhancement Matricies, all knitted into the fabric of the world such that they'd hold themselves together…
It was the mental exertion of placing your hand on a hot stove, despite knowing what would happen. And then doing it again. And again. And again. Releasing spells was hard, it was infusing them with Will in a way that there isn't much analogous to in mundane life. And while normally I could manage a few of them easily enough, doing so many right after one another was hard.
But there was just one more spell to add to that stack.
"Enact:: Prime Redirection Ward."
Prime Redirection Ward (8 Dice, 9 Again) = (9 2) 5 8 5 2 (9 1) 1 (9 3) = 4 Successes
With an audible crackle and clank, the spell settled into place, a briefly visible shimmer appearing in the very air as the Supernal Truths interacted with the air around them. It'd only last about an hour, but as I poured power into it, I smiled, I'd been a bit worried, but it felt solid.
I stood up, cracking my back as I did, the two sorcerers pausing in their shaping power nearly as one.
"Warding spell's in place finally, how are you two holding up?"
"We are quite alright, amiliki," the raptor-like Huitzilin said with a little bob of his (or her) head, the feathers on its long neck ruffling slightly.
"Bored." Chalchiuitl said in a raspy grunt, which made Huitzilin give the pterodactyl-esque Dragon King an aghast glare.
I couldn't help it, I laughed.
Despite the contrite look the raptor-sorcerer gave me, I just smiled at the blunter of the two, "Don't worry, I understand. This next bit should go a fair bit faster with your help. It's a lot less… delicate. Same idea, just a lot quicker this time." I looked between them, "Had you both ramped it up all the way with that?"
"Yes, amiliki." Huitzilin said, still shooting little glares at Chalchiuitl.
"Okay," I said with a nod, "That works out great. I can work with that. If you start up again, we'll open up that gate. Just you two be ready, when I bring my arms up outwards, I want you two to cut your shaping and get out of those circles."
Both of them looked at me in askance, but I shrugged, "I don't know the targeting mechanism the wards are using, it'll probably be focused on me, but if you two are linked to me by shaping sorcery in my direction, it might aim for you as well, and this spell won't be able to defend you as well. It isn't worth the risk. When I bring my arms up, I'm about to finish the spell, so keep yourselves safe and cut yourselves off and get out of the design for good measure."
Charisma + Persuasion (6 Dice) = 1 1 5 6 (10 6) 7 = ???
The two of them shared a glance, an unspoken conversation going between them before they turned back, nodding.
"Alright, this won't be a long one," if they'd actually been assisting me in the casting it'd have inherently taken longer, but since they were basically just acting as batteries I could cast quickly, "So be ready."
At their nods, I closed my eyes and took a cleansing breath. I could feel the river of power starting to flow again within moments as they began to shape the power around themselves.
Valor = 7 1 = Success
Right, now for the moment of truth.
An abrupt twist of my hands and working of Will sent a pseudo-electrical current through the runic circuits I'd built, sparks the color of light through a forest canopy dancing along the gears and belts carved in the ground, giving them the illusion of motion even as the power moved through them. I set the defensive spell in place, separate from my power with an expenditure of Will.
Despite my unease and the growing ache behind my eyes, I began my working. With my motonic converter magic running hot, power pouring around me, I constructed another , "Runtime Start:: #Arcanum<Death>, #Practice(Fraying) , #Practice(Weaving) ;" My nimbus flared into blazing existence around me this time, real, literal light as my power met what the Dragon Kings were moving in my direction.
There were visible water wheels of circuitry on either side of me, spinning rapidly under the flow even as the mechanisms built from nothing. The gears and pistons once more forming as I built up pressure, using the much greater amounts of power available to buffer against the creeping unreality of the Abyss.
My arms rose, and the waves of power rushing over me cut off, but I couldn't open my eyes now to double check that they'd actually gotten out of the way, I was too deep in the spell to do so safely.
Reality itself pushed back against my efforts, denying my working, there was a barrier here between realities, between the realm of the dead and the realm of the living, and magic declared that it was sacrosanct. I brought my arms across my chest roughly, as if tearing aside the veil with my bare hands as I finished describing the magic in High Speech, "Yantra(Mantra, Mandola, Epimetheus) ; Variables(Set) ; Enact:: Ghost Gate!"
Ghost Gate (14 Dice, 9 Again) = 4 4 7 4 8 4 1 4 6 5 1 7 3 8 = 2 Successes
And so I firmly reminded reality where it could shove it.
The circuit-drill slammed into the barriers between the living and the dead and punched its way through, the same wash of living power surging through as it stabilized. And just as expected, within a moment of its stabilizing, golden lightning arced out from the gate straight towards myself!
Wards! Redirect! (9 1) 2 4 4 6 2 4 (10 4) 5 ; Shield! 2 4 2 3 7 8 7 (9 7) 2
Gritting my teeth, I just planted my feet, bracing myself for another terrible flash of pain. My hands had not coincidentally been put in front of my face by the final motion of the spell. But their presence was unneeded, the bolt of golden power arcing harmlessly over my head and slamming into the space I'd prepared.
The grass and ground exploding behind me, clods of dirt and greenery raining down on my shoulders and slapping uselessly against my back.
Lowering my arms, I looked over the ghost gate I'd created with the Dragon Kings assistance.
Roughly gear-shaped, a vertical plane of color and vibrance that was a stark contrast with the somber, still nature of the world around us. It was a semi-circle, the upper half of one that sealed against the ground, it was about five meters high, plenty of space even for the largest of the Dragon Kings here. From this angle, the pale sun was cut in half by the gateway, and while in the Underworld it was a pale white, the sky around it a deep purple with only hints of red or orange, through the gateway it was a brilliant orange, the sky awash with every color of the rainbow. It was a humbling, beautiful contrast.
With a smile that was simultaneously relieved and proud, I twirled Prometheus and Epimetheus about, "And there we have it." A large weight settled onto my shoulder and I glanced up, "Mm?"
Tlacotl loomed over me, a massive scaly claw on my shoulder. This close, it was pretty obvious that she outmassed me by about five times, her shoulders as broad as three of me, standing nearly three feet taller than me, and being made entirely made of bulky, scaly muscle and claws. How the flying fuck I'd missed her approaching was beyond me. Yellow eyes focused on me as she growled, "You will be going through first."
Temperance = 10 9 1 1 1 = Success
I blinked once in confusion before shrugging as I realized the intention, "Sure."
She was worried I was trying to screw them over in some manner, it was basically the same idea as telling someone to switch glasses with you when you suspected the one they were giving you was poisoned. The kicker was that I had built up an immunity to iocane powder ages ago.
That and I wasn't trying to screw them over.
I started to walk forward, only to be stopped by the claw that was easily the size of half my torso. I looked back at her with a raised eyebrow, "I can't walk through if you're holding on to me."
Tlacotl's purple muzzle furrowed, scrunching up not in a snarl but in some other sort of expression. One I struggled to puzzle out… but after a moment she growled out, "Together."
Temperance = 10 4 3 3 3 = Success
"Sure," I agreed, just a little tersely. I was admittedly getting tired of the suspicion, even if I could understand it, I gestured at the gate with Prometheus in my right hand, "Shall we?"
Those yellow eyes narrowed, and the burly Dragon King didn't move. Instead glaring at me as if trying to see what my game was.
I rolled my eyes, sighing, "Look, there's literally nothing I can do to convince you that I'm telling the truth. Literally any choice you make could be walking into a trap. I'm not screwing with you, but I have nothing to prove that other than whatever's on the other side of this gate."
An unhappy rumble came from Tlacotl's throat, but I stood firm. And after a moment, as the growl trailed off, I gestured at the gateway once more, "So… shall we?"
With a little snort, the burly Dragon King gave me a shove. And I was quite proud that I didn't fall flat on my face, instead just stumbling slightly. Shaking my head, I adjusted my overcoat as I walked forward, keeping a grip on both Prometheus and Epimetheus.
Temperance = 9 9 8 8 4 = 4 Successes
The thudding footsteps of Tlacotl behind me were slightly unnerving, but I'd deal with it. I glanced at Secret, finding the pale young woman giving me a worried look, to which I just smiled a bit. I knew Tlacotl's type, I didn't know if she'd ever trust me, but so long as I was on the up and up she'd actually defend me if bad shit happened.
Unless this was all one big play by the Dragon Kings, but I doubted that. I didn't even exist more than a month ago, they wouldn't have had enough information to set up such a successful con. Didn't mean my traitorous brain didn't offer the idea, but eh. Whatever. I'd deal with it in the unlikely scenario it was true.
With the burly Dragon King half a step behind me, I walked through the hole in reality with every measure of confidence I could have.
… wow.
Electric tingles danced across my skin, a buzz not unlike touching a doorknob in the winter going through my entire body. A pulse of power through every inch of my skin and into my soul… breathing in sent those jolting tingles throughout my insides, like the biting cold air in winter could sting your insides, it crackled inside my throat and lungs.
A full body shiver went through me, my eyes closing in a brief, desperate bid to keep out the sudden onslaught of [Power] and [Essence] and [Fate] and so many other things that my Mage Sight revealed to me.
And it didn't stop. Every breath was like that, a not unpleasant tingle, a shock to my system at the sheer magnitude of power flowing through here. Even the mightiest Supernal Verges… the deepest wells of Hallowed power in the world of darkness barely compared to a fraction of this power… it was like creeping vines spreading through my body through my lungs and skin, each trying to meet the other as power spread through me.
I looked up at the sky, at the slow transition from soft blue to the midnight black, stars appearing like little specks. An unfamiliar sky… the stars themselves were different, arranged differently from what I'd known… it was subtle, but it was there… but for all that subtlety, it was lost on the part of me that perceived [Truth].
They weren't stars, not as we knew them. They weren't enormous, multi-octillion-ton nuclear furnaces impossibly distant… no… these were truly pinpricks in the dome of the sky, little lights far more distant than one would assume. The sun… no… the [Daystar], it was something else entirely.
This world… it truly was something different. This wasn't jus tanother aspect of my own world, this wasn't just myself deluding myself into seeing things that weren't truly there… I was in another reality, seeing another sky, this was a new world, alive and thriving.
And I'd been tasked with saving this?
I'd been tasked with saving this.
I'd been tasked with saving this?
I'd been tasked with saving this.
In that moment, that realization, I felt very, very small. Like... like a miniscule gear in an impossibly large machine, nothing more than the tiniest little cogwheel spinning in place inside something massive and indescribable… and… and I knew exactly what part of that great machine I was. I was a small mechanism, a little program hidden in the vast reaches of code… and I was antivirus… I was optimization… I was…
I was Ṭ͈̭̩̄̌͑̄̔̈́̚ͅ█̶̨ͥ͂̍͗͏͉͖̲͚̺█̡̢̞̱͕͉̬͎̦̮̓̒̎̋ͅ ͕͔̗̑̌̉̈̽̌̚̚͠B̹̼̮͍̤̫̥̲̞̐̄͛͆͂̓̽█̧̟̩̳͇̤͔̑ͦͧͭ̈̽ͧ́█͚̭͖̤̙̬͓ͪv̸̼͉͆̅̏͂̏ͫ̊̓̿͢█̪ͮ̔̿͑̒ͩ̐͢ ̰̖̱͎̮̞̠̬͊͑͑̍̄́ͯͩ͟█̷̛̺͇̼̙̪̱͓ͬ̎ͩ̄ͪ̇̄͘█̆̅̀͋͗̃̽͟҉̶̻͍█ͯͤͮ̚͏̨̛̥̞͍█̡̳͓̪̣̙ͬ͑͒̎̿̊̓ͨ͠█͇̙̩͇͖̖̫́̈̇̍͐̓̌̍̕█̟͔̳̓̃͘͞█̆͏̨̞̗̮̞̭̫̰ͅ█̷̱̦̓̔̊ͫ͌̉̂́͠█̶̗̟̑̉ͫ͒͒̕͢█̜̘͚̣̑͊ͪ̀̕͜█̆̆҉̟͙̘͙͉̲̟̺̭͟█̧̖̠̯̤͖͈̮̥̎̄̽͟͜█̒͏̨̩̘̀ ̛͙͇͉̀ͪ̅̀͒̒͆ͯ█̨͎̤̱̭̤̟̯̣̃u̟̬̫͔̣̜͙͙̇͛ͩ̃͋͑ͨͧ█̡̫̯̘̖̮͌̿͑͛ͧͩͨ́̚͜█ͭ͆̊̾͏͓͕̖͞█̶̳̝̖̱̎̍█̛̜͉̱̬̻̙̔n͎̹̗̔̂̇ͧ͆ͩ̈́ͪ̇́͟͠t̶̢͇̞̗̂̐ͩ̿̑͘█̝̣̞͙̓̓͞█̧̡̰͓̇̌ͬ̃̅̐̕ͅ ̴̢̗̹̯͚͇̗̂̆̒͂̈́͠█̘̞͓̪͗ͩ̅͜͞f̝̥͈̝͇̙ͭͨ͋̂̎̉͊͟ ̪̤͎̦̭̯͖̬̊ͪ̒̐ͦͯ̀͢█͇̉̎̑͡u̜̰̩̩̮̯͔͉ͦ͛̍̈̓̆ͥ͠f͖͔͎͔̞͔̙̓́̾̐f͆̾̎ͮ͂̆͆ͦ̌͜͏̮͞█͓ͨͭͩ̌̋͆͠█̶̨̰̻̗̻̳̝̠̜̗̽͌ͤ͆̒̏̕█͓͓̦̬̘̄ͣ̄ͧ̍̐ͤͅņ̛̞̽ͪ̀̈́̓͂̾̕█̲̤͔͖̍̄̎̂ͭ̾̑.
I'd… I'd felt this before… back when I'd first been initiated into the [Truth]. On my first mystery play, my first journey into the arcane, when Yuko had forcefully opened my eyes and Awakened me to magic… it was like that, only on such a grander scale…
The setting sun passed beneath the tops of the trees, and like a switch being thrown, the moment of realization was gone. The wonder and awe and Knowing crushed beneath the weight of perspective. I tore my way free from the sight.
A shuddering breath escaped me, and I wrapped my arms rightly around my waist, hugging myself to force down that feeling of terrifyingly smallness.
Tears were running down my face, and I had to scrunch up my eyes against the pain. I'd just been staring at the sun… ugh, like a fucking dumbass. Rubbing at my eyes with the back of my knuckles, I desperately tried to reorder my thoughts, "This the right place?"
There was no response, and blinking blearily, I looked around, half expecting Tlacotl to have had not come with me or something… but instead, the burly Dragon King was looking down at me with a strange expression.
The after-image of the [Daystar] was still burned into my retinas, so I couldn't make her out properly, even ignoring the blurring of my tears, "… Tlacotl? What is it?"
"That…" she started, but after a moment, she shook her head, "It's nothing. This is the right place. The manse was damaged by the passage of time and the growth of the wildlife, but it will not take too much effort to rebuild…"
"We're on an uncapped demense now…?" Demense's, in the lore of Exalted, were the places where energy pooled, where it welled up in enormous amounts. In a world of magic, they were the places of Power. While only some of them were a 'big deal' so to speak, apparently they were a big deal to me. Eesh. "No wonder I spaced out…"
"It is your first time in an uncapped demense?"
I shook my head, "No, but none this powerful. It caught me off guard, especially after being in the Underworld."
Technically true, hell, mostly true honestly. But it didn't really capture the fact that I was from another reality and not used to the absurd power surging through places such as this.
Tlacotl just nodded, "It is a demense of the fourth degree, so such a thing isn't unheard of…"
I finally took the time to look at the actual place we'd appeared in, a mirror of the previous place. But whereas that one had been perfectly preserved, seeming more like a tropical island with a chill wind… this was almost like an overgrown rainforest. The same basic structures, rings of towers and a set of pyramids around a central circle… but trees grew out of some of the towers, all of them crawling with moss, and some of the structures covered in vines… and on every plant there were these strange blooms… that actually glowed in the dim light. They just resonated with power…
"I'm sorry that your old home is in such a state." I said, after a moment.
She paused, looking at me, "It's alright, we expected as much. It will be difficult for us to repair, but in time, we shall do so. Thank you."
Okay, gotta admit, that felt good. I smiled warmly up at her, enjoying the pleasant little tingles in my chest, a good contrast to the almost electric power of this place, "You're welcome."
"Kenobi!"
Secret's voice made me turn around, looking back through the gate. She was still standing beside Rambena, both of them watching us cautiously, as were the other, more distant Dragon Kings on the other side of the gate. "Yeah?" I hollered back.
"Everything okay?"
I gave her a thumbs up, "Doing fine! Tlacotl and I were just having a moment is all!"
The large, purple Dragon King gave me a glare, "Did you have to say that?"
"Yes?" I grinned up at her cheekily, significantly more comfortable with her now even as she growled unhappily.
With a pleased little smile, I turned back to the portal fully, "Right, I'll do some fiddling to make sure the runes don't get messed up. If they're broken the spell itself will break and I'll need to reinforce them to ensure that doesn't happen."
"Kenobi-Amiliki."
I paused mid-turn, "Yeah-?" Massive arms reached for me-?! My arms snapped up towards a defensive stance almost reflesively as the massive arms–
Passed right through me.
Tlacotl and I both blinked a few times as the Dragon King's attempt to pull me into a quite possibly literally bone crushing hug failed spectacularly.
"… oh. Right. Ghost. Creation. You're intangible by default." Hell, I could probably only see here because my Mage Sight was open…
The purple Dragon King scowled, "This may be problematic."
"Really gonna damp down on those strangling plans huh?" I snarked with a grin.
Her scowl deepened, "Keep it up and it might."
I grinned, heading back towards the gateway hanging in the air, "I'll get to work then."
"Kenobi-Amiliki. Again… thank you. You cannot understand how much this means to us." She didn't turn fully, looking out into the forest, "It is as Rambena said… we can never truly repay you for helping us save the soul of our people."
The smile I gave this time was much smaller, much more subdued, but… deeper all the same, "You're welcome."
Gnosis +1
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